Chief Minister Raman Singh has called upon people of the State to take a pledge for conserving forests on the eve of International Day of Forests on Saturday. In his message, the Chief Minister said, "forests are the source of existence for human beings and all life forms. Forests provide us with oxygen, several wild herbs save us from different kinds of diseases and collection/processing of various forest produce support livelihood of lakhs of tribal and other people living in the State."
The eco-balance depends on forests as they prevent the erosion of river beds, conserves monsoon water, increase land fertility, maintains water level. The forests have important role to play in conserving bio-diversity, Singh said. He said that Chhattisgarh has 59,772 sq kms of forest area which is 44.2 per cent of total land area of the State. Various steps are being undertaken by the State Government with public participation to conserve forests, he said.
Mentioning about Joint Forest Management scheme, the Chief Minister informed that there are 7,887 forest management committees run by villagers at local level. It has over 27.63 lakh members which have been entrusted with responsibility of safeguarding 33,190 sq km forest area, he said. From Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) fund sapling plantation works are being undertaken State-wide, he said.
Notably, the Urban Administration Department (UAD) in July last year had issued directives to the officers to carry out a major plantation drive in their respective areas. The Department has set a target of planting 1.75 lakh saplings for all municipalities. The Joint Secretary of Urban Administration Department has conveyed the target to be achieved by the Commissioners of municipal corporations and chief municipal officers of the municipalities and asked them to go for tree plantation according to the target. He has also directed officers to provide a ‘monthly achievement report’ on plantation. The Department has set a target of plantation of 6300 saplings for Raipur Municipal Corporation (RMC) and 6000 saplings for each of the remaining nine municipal corporations.
The municipalities have been directed to carry out plantation of 1600 saplings . The 28 municipalities have been given a target of planting 51,200 saplings while Nagar Panchayats have handed over a target of plantation of 500 saplings each. The officers have been instructed not to plant Jatropha saplings on the side of the roads. They have been asked to plant those saplings on roadside which grow at a brisk rate. The plants which beautify the road should also be selected for plantation. They have been asked to plant Neem saplings also.
Directives have also been issued to carry out dense plantation in the vacant land of the schools and hostels with campus greater than one acre. For Bastar and Surguja districts, directives have been given for plantation of Kusum and Mahua tress besides bamboo. For remaining districts in the division, it has been asked for plantation of bamboo saplings.