NATIONAL MISSION FOR GREEN INDIA - GOVERNMENT SCHEMES
News: States
fall short of targets to improve forest cover, quality
What's in the news?
● India
is lagging behind in the targets to increase the number and quality of tree-
and forest-cover plantations set in the Green India Mission, according to data
accessed via the Right To Information Act.
Key takeaways:
● As
per the India State of Forest Report-2021,
forest and tree cover in the country
increased by 2,261 square kilometers since the last assessment in 2019.
India’s total forest and tree cover was 80.9 million hectares, which accounted
for 24.62% of the geographical area of
the country.
● The
report said 17 States and Union
Territories had more than 33% of their area under forest cover.
● Madhya Pradesh
had the largest forest cover, followed by Arunachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh,
Odisha and Maharashtra.
● The
top five States in terms of forest cover as a percentage of their total
geographical area were Mizoram
(84.53%), Arunachal Pradesh (79.33%), Meghalaya (76%), Manipur (74.34%) and
Nagaland (73.90%).
Issues:
● However
critics have pointed out that the increase
in green cover was almost entirely via commercial plantations, that in an
ecological sense - couldn’t compensate for natural forests and their
biodiversity and, being monocultures, were susceptible to pest attacks.
National Mission for Green India:
● National
Mission for a Green India (GIM) is one
of the eight Missions under the National Action Plan on Climate Change.
● It
is implemented by the Ministry of
Environment, Forests and Climate Change.
Features:
● The
target under the Mission is 10Million
Hectares (Mha) on forest and non-forest lands for increasing the forest/tree
cover and to improve the quality of existing forest.
● Improving
tree cover is critical to sequester carbon and bolster India’s carbon stocks as
part of its international commitments to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions.
Objectives:
● It
aims at protecting, restoring and enhancing India’s diminishing forest cover
and responding to climate change by a combination of adaptation and mitigation
measures.
Mission Goals:
● To
increase forest/tree cover to the extent of 5 million hectares (mha) and
improve quality of forest/tree cover on another 5 mha of forest/non-forest
lands.
● To
improve/enhance ecosystem services like carbon sequestration and storage (in
forests and other ecosystems), hydrological services and biodiversity; along
with provisioning services like fuel, fodder, and timber and non-timber forest
produces (NTFPs).
● To
increase forest based livelihood income
of about 3 million households.
● It
will be implemented on both public as well as private lands with a key role of
the local communities in planning, decision making, implementation and
monitoring.
● To
increase carbon sequestration by 50–60
million tonnes annually by the year 2020.