In the days to come, private players will be allowed to develop degraded forest land under private-public partnership model.
The Environment Ministry will soon announce a scheme to allow private players to develop degraded forest land under the PPP model. “We have forest land where there are no forests. We have already formulated a scheme and it will be put on the Ministry’s website soon,” said Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar on the sidelines of 10th Sustainable Summit of CII, on Tuesday.
He said the degraded forest land would be given on lease which industrialists, who otherwise import wood, will harness for commercial purposes. However, it will be mandatory to grow local species of plants and trees on at least 10 per cent of such land for sustainability of flora and fauna.
Javadekar said that the scheme would benefit the industry as their dependence on imported wood would be reduced and employment generated for the locals. However, the ownership of land would rest with the Government.
He stressed on the importance of research and development for creating sustainable practices in environment, while speaking at the CII summit on Sustainability. He said that India is not an IT-superpower but an IT-labour contractor as it lacks innovation.
“We say that we are IT-superpower but we are not. We are IT-labour contractors. We have not come up with Facebook, WhatsApp, Google, any new operating system or real new product,” he said.
Indian industries must start investing more in research and development. Unless we research and come out with solutions, we do not get the benefit. Industrial progress should be based on it, added the Minister.