The State Forest Minister Dinesh Aggarwal has instructed Forest Department officials to ensure that works don’t remain restricted to official files, but are also executed effectively on the ground. Presiding over a conservators of forests meeting in Dehradun on Thursday, the minister issued instructions for various tasks, including tree plantation and redressal of human-wildlife conflict, among others.
Seeking information about tree plantation undertaken in 2014-15 in the State, Aggarwal also sought details of tree plantation undertaken in the past 10 years. He said that nurseries of native flora should be developed and trees planted according to their geographical range.
Reviewing soil and water conservation works, the minister directed the officials build check dams and small water reservoirs to check land loss in forests. Pine logs and pine needles should be used to build check dams at sites where building conventional check dams is not possible. He said that plantation of foliage trees and provision of water should be ensured in pine forests to prevent forest fires. The minister also sought information about action taken on the directions of the chief minister Harish Rawat for mitigating the movement of monkeys to urban areas.
“Fruit trees should be planted in the forests to prevent the simians from moving to the urban areas. Monkeys should be caught and released in dense forests. Monkey sterilisation should be undertaken to check the population of monkeys for which one centre each should be opened in Garhwal and Kumaon to facilitate scientific seterilisation of the simians.” Aggarwal directed department officials to prepare a proposal for relaxation in the Government order to mitigate the human-boar conflict.
The principal chief conservator of forests SS Sharma informed the minister that the department has set targets of planting 71.90 lakh trees on 6416 hectares in Kumaon division and 64 lakh trees on 6702 hectares in Garhwal division. He further informed that the department had set a target of planting 1.38 lakh deodar trees, 4.79 lakh oak trees and 13,000 rhododendron trees in the Kumaon region. Earlier, on being told by departmental officers about confusion regarding e-payment system, Sharma said that he had talked to the Forest minister and Finance minister who had informed him that this system is being implemented in all departments and that the forest department had not yet made a representation on this issue to the State administration.