India’s forests hold the future, Pg9

Key Highlights:

• India aims to restore 25 million hectares of degraded land by 2030 under the revised Green India Mission (GIM).
• This initiative is linked to India's climate pledge to create an additional carbon sink of up to 3.39 billion tonnes of CO₂ equivalent by the end of this decade.
• A 2025 IIT study reported a 12% decline in photosynthetic efficiency in India's dense forests due to rising temperatures and drying soil.
• The CAMPA fund holds ₹95,000 crore, but its utilization is inconsistent across states.

Detailed Insights:

• The revised GIM focuses on biodiversity-rich landscapes like the Aravalli Hills, Western Ghats, mangroves, and Himalayan catchments, linking efforts with other government programs like the National Agroforestry Policy.
• Between 2015 and 2021, the GIM supported afforestation across 11.22 million hectares, with ₹575 crore disbursed to 18 states, increasing forest and tree cover from 24.16% in 2015 to 25.17% in 2023.
• The Forest Rights Act (2006) empowers local communities to manage forests, but many afforestation drives bypass them, eroding trust and undermining social legitimacy.
• Afforestation efforts are shifting towards native, site-specific species to enhance ecological resilience, moving away from monocultures like eucalyptus and acacia that deplete groundwater and harm biodiversity.
• Some states are experimenting with new financing tools, such as Himachal Pradesh's biochar program for carbon credits and Uttar Pradesh's efforts to connect village councils to carbon markets.
• Effective implementation requires empowering communities, equipping forest departments with ecological expertise, and enhancing accountability through public dashboards tracking key metrics.

Key Concepts Involved:

• Afforestation: The establishment of a forest or stand of trees in an area where there was no previous tree cover.
• Carbon Sink: A natural or artificial reservoir that accumulates and stores carbon-containing chemical compounds for an indefinite period.
• Ecological Resilience: The capacity of an ecosystem to respond to a disturbance by resisting damage and recovering quickly.
• Monoculture: The cultivation of a single crop in a given area.