South Indian forest ministers to launch coordination panel

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A conference of forest ministers of southern states held here on Thursday decided to form a southern forest ministers' interstate coordination council to coordinate the inter-state activities on forest and environment issues.

The conference stressed the need for joint operations of the states and coordination  between the enforcement agencies to check poaching in forests.

A full-time secretariat will be constituted in the forest departments of all the states under the council. Kerala Forest Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan will be the president of the council for the first year.

Mr. Radhakrishnan told reporters that it was also decided to hold such conferences periodically. The next meeting will be held in Hyderabad in November and later  in Bangalore in January 2016. Steps like creating data bank of forest cases would be initiated in the due course.

The conference was initiated by the Kerala government in the wake of recent exposure of rampant poaching. “We have decided to take various measures on joint enforcement against poaching. These could not be revealed due to security reasons,”  said Mr. Radhakrishnan.

Inaugurating the conference, Chief Minister  Oommen Chandy said that the recent reports of poaching in Kerala forests and red sander smuggling in Andhra Pradesh highlighted  the need for coordinated efforts of neighbouring states to curb such illegal activities.

Andhra Forest Minister B. Gopalakrishna Reddy, Karnataka  Minister Ramanath Rai, Telangana  Minster Jogu Ramanna and senior forest officials of all southern states attended the conference.

EXPERT COMMITTEE
Karnataka Forest Minister Ramanath Rai said that an expert committee would be formed to study  the night traffic ban along the NH 212 connecting Kozhikode and Bangalore. “Based on the expert committee’s recommendation we would take a decision on easing the restrictions,” he said.