TS to have 33% green cover in the next decade, says MA&UD spl chief secretary

HYDERABAD: Around 100 trees that were impacted during the construction of the Formula E race track were being removed and relocated to the immediate next corridor, according to Arvind Kumar, special chief secretary, MA&UD.

Addressing the webinar ‘Green City Briefing’ organized by the International Association of Horticultural Producers (AIPH) on Tuesday, Kumar said, “Not a single tree is being uprooted and damaged. We have taken full responsibility for the survival of the trees. The success rate of transplantation is 100%.” He asserted that the Telangana government intends to increase the green cover from the current 25% to 33% over the next 10 years.

He spoke about the ‘Green Garland to the State of Telangana’ (Telangana Ku Haritha Haram) initiative by the state, which resulted in Hyderabad winning the ‘Green City Award’ on October 14 of this year.

The initiative featured successful projects of urban forests and urban parks for lung space that were located within the 50 km radius of the city limits, lake development and restoration as well as adoption by corporate sectors. Further, he said geo-tagging and drone technology was being adopted to monitor the saplings planted during the Haritha Haram programme.

"The forest department has identified about 30 different types of saplings and trees, and every urban block in the state has a nursery that offers free saplings distribution. Hyderabad has more than 150 such nurseries and the survival rate of plantation is about 90%”,” he said

Bishop Ngobeli, manager of Protected Areas & Enforcement at Johannesburg City Parks & Zoo and founder of Association of Parks and Recreation Africa, shared his knowledge and perspectives on the subject, while Bill Hardy, chair of AIPH Green City Committee, facilitated a Q&A session.