Chief Minister Hemant Soren on Tuesday instructed officials to make a detailed work plan to save the environment in the State. “An action plan should be made to prevent encroachment of the hills of the Capital City and its surroundings and to undertake plantation on a large scale from the origin of the Harmu River and Swarnarekha River,” he said while holding the review meeting of Forest, Environment and Climate Change department here on Tuesday.
The CM asked to take steps towards planting medium-sized plants in urban areas, especially in the capital city. On this occasion, departmental officials informed the CM about the updated information about the programmes being run in other areas while protecting forests and preventing forest erosion.
Soren said that for the expansion of forest areas, saplings should be planted on a large scale in the forest as well as non-forest areas. Where there is an open forest, an action plan should be prepared to make it a moderate forest and make moderate forest a dense forest. The department should take initiative to increase the dense forest area in districts like Deoghar, Pakur, Dumka and Dhanbad.
The CM said that the department should work towards increasing the number of nurseries in the state. Currently 108 nurseries are being operated by the Forest Department. He asked to develop a nursery in every block. This nursery should be in at least 5 acres of land. These nurseries should have a system of plants, which is very important for the farmers. On this occasion, the department officials informed that fruit bearing plants of different species are available in their nurseries for Rs 5, the CM said for this information should be widely publicised so that people can get trees and trees according to their needs.
Soren said that the tribal population here still earn livelihood through forest produce. Therefore, the department should take initiative in promoting forest produce. Under this, trees like bair, safflower, palash should be planted, this will help in promoting lacquer production. He asked to give the responsibility to women groups.
The CM also laid special emphasis on planting shady and fruit bearing trees along the roads. He said that a list of which trees is more useful to be planted along the roads needs to be prepared. He said that today encroachment of forest areas is happening at a rapid pace. In this case, the forest area should be covered with demarcation by doing Geo mapping.
He said that there is a lot of tourism potential in the forest areas of Jharkhand. In this way, the department should prepare a blue print towards developing potential forest areas for tourism. He said that local youth should be kept as guides in tourism potential areas. Employment creation will be encouraged.
Chief Secretary Sukhdev Singh, Development Commissioner KK Khandelwal, Principal Secretary to Chief Minister Rajiv Arun Ekka, Principal Secretary of Forest Environment and Climate Change Department AP Singh, PCCF PK Verma, PCCF AK Rastogi, APCCF DK Tewatia, APCCF S. Srivastava, APCCF NK Singh and Special Secretary Shailaja Singh were present in the review meeting.