India State of Forest Report 2013 released by Union Environment Minister

 09-JUL-2014

India State of Forest Report (ISFR) 2013 was released in New Delhi by Prakash Javadekar, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Environment, Forests & Climate of 8 July 2014. The India State of Forest Report 2013 is 13th report in the series.

Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar released the India State of Forest Report-2013 at a function in New Delhi. The report provides information on forest cover, tree cover, mangrove cover and growing stock inside and outside forest areas.

Information that is available in the India State of Forest Report 2013
• Information on forest cover, tree cover mangroves cover (occupies an area of 4628 square kilometer making India for nearly three percent of the world's mangrove vegetation) and growing stock inside and outside the forest areas
• The report has also highlighted special thematic information on forest cover such as tribal districts, hill districts and north eastern region had also been given separately
• The information of forest cover for all the States and districts for the current assessment and changes with respect to forest cover of previous assessment is also available

Three new chapters have been added in the report
• Important Characteristics of India’s Forest – the chapter describes important features of forest areas like regeneration status, susceptibility to various injuries, crop composition, its origin, forest soil characteristic and others
• Trees in Agroforestry System – the chapter provides information on area, growing stock and carbon stock and other things under Agroforestry
• Urban Tree Resources –  the chapter provides information on green cover and growing stock of wood in urban areas

The report in its assessment has said that total forest and tree cover of the country is 87.92 million hectare, which turns up to be 24.01 percent of the geographical area of India. When compared to the 2011 assessment, the forest cover of the country has increased by 5871 square kilometer.

Based on assessment, States with maximum increase in forest cover are
• West Bengal - 3810 square kilometer
• Odisha - 1444 square kilometer
• Kerala - 622 square kilometer

Apart from this, the assessment also highlighted certain states with largest forest cover and they are
• Madhya Pradesh - has the largest forest cover of 77522 square kilometer in terms of area in the country
• Arunachal Pradesh - with forest cover of 67321 square kilometer

Mizoram in terms of percentage of forest to Geographical area with respect to total geographical area 90.38 percent had highest forest cover. In this aspect, Mizoram was followed by Lakshadweep with 84.56 percent

Apart from this, the report says that 15 States or Union Territories has above 33 percent of the geographical area under forest cover. Whereas of these states and UTs Mizoram, Lakshadweep, A&N Island, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Meghalaya, Manipur and Tripura had more than 75 percent forest cover. While 7 States namely Goa, Sikkim, Kerala, Uttarakhand, Dadra & Nagar Haveli, Chhattisgarh and Assam had forest cover between 33 percent and 75 percent.

The report’s estimates highlighted the total growing stock of India’s forest and trees outside forests as 5658.046 million, which comprises of 4173.362 million cum inside the forests and 1484.68 million cum outside the forests.

IT also highlighted that the carbon stock in India’s forest was estimated to be 6941 million tonnes. While, it suggests an increase of 278 million tonnes in the carbon stock of country as compared to the year 2004 as reported in ISFR 2011.

About the India State of Forest Report (ISFR) 2013
The ISFR 2013 is based on interpretation of LISS III sensor data of indigenous Resources at-II satellite with spatial resolution of 23.5 meter with minimum mapable area of one ha for the period October 2010–January 2012.

Apart from the interpretation of satellite, the report is also followed by extensive and rigorous ground truthing. In addition, periodic ground data collected by field parties and information from other collateral sources were also used to improve the accuracy of the interpreted image.  Change matrices recorded in the present report refer to changes with respect to the last report i.e. ISFR 2011.

Forest Survey of India (FSI) has been assessing the forest and tree resources of our country on a biennial basis since 1987. The results of the assessment have been published in its biennial report India State of Forest Report (ISFR).