Andhra Pradesh diverts 1,125 sq km forest area over 35 years

Visakhapatnam: Over the 35 years from 1980, undivided Andhra Pradesh has diverted about 112554.963 hectare of forest land which is about 1,125 sq km and more than the geographical size of Hyderabad.

According to the Ministry of Forests and Environment data, after Arunachal Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, AP has diverted large forest area land under Forest (Conservation) Act (FCA). Environmentalists opine that though compensatory plantation is being taken up under Compensatory Forestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA), it is disrupting the eco-system totally.

The reason is that the forest department is mostly adopting monoculture plantation by planting one kind of species clearing and felling different plant species of forests.

Speaking to this correspondent, some forest officials, not wanting to be named, also said that the lands being earmarked for plantation after diversion of forest lands are barren and not suitable for plantation and efforts are hardly taken to protect the planted trees.

Assistant Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (APCCF) N. Prateep Kumar, however, said that the department is not encouraging mono-culture plantation.
“We cannot say its mono culture as we are planting trees that are native to that area and adding different variety of species of that tree. For example, teak in Visakhapatnam and Narsipatnam, non-teak secondary hard wood in Paderu and at Casuarinas in coastal regions are being planted,” he added.

The aerial seeding being taken up by the forest department has also come under the scanner. A forest official said there were no mechanism that could assess the real output of the aerial seeding.

After bifurcation, the state would also avail less fund from the CAMPA fund collected from various user agency as the fund would be distributed as per the area of the forest lands diverted from the respective state area of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.