Forest Cover in India

Forest Cover in India

As per India State of Forest Report, 2011, the forest cover of India is 6,92,027 Km2. The details of forest cover, state-wise are given below :- State/UT Geographical  Area  2011 Assessment Very Dense Forest Mod. Dense Forest Open Forest Total Forest cover as percentage of geographical area (%) Andhra Pradesh 275069 850 26242 19297 46389 16.86 Arunachal Pradesh 83743 20868 31519 15023 67410 80.50 Assam 78438 1444 11404 14825 27673 35.28 Bihar 94163 231 3280 3334 6845 7.27 Chhattisgarh 135191 4163 34911 16600 55674 41.18 Delhi 1483 7 49 120 176 11.88 Goa 3702 543 585 1091 2219 59.94 Gujarat 196022 376 5231 9012 14619 7.46 Haryana 44212 27 457 1124 1608 3.64 Himachal Pradesh 55673 3224 6381 5074 14679 26.37 Jammu & Kashmir 222236 4140 8760 9639 22539 10.14 Jharkhand 79714 2590 9917 10470 22977 28.82 Karnataka 191791 1777 20179 14238 36194 18.87 Kerala 38863 1442 9394 6464 17300 44.52 Madhya Pradesh 308245 6640 34986 36074 77700 25.21 Maharashtra 307713 8736 20815 21095 50646 16.46 Manipur 22327 730 6151 10209 17090 76.54 Meghalaya 22429 433 9775 7067 17275 77.02 Mizoram 21081 134 6086 12897 19117 90.68 Nagaland 16579 1293 4931 7094 13318 80.33 Orissa 155707 7060 21366 20477 48903 31.41 Punjab 50362 0 736 1028 1764 3.50 Rajasthan 342239 72 4448 11567 16087 4.70 Sikkim 7096 500 2161 698 3359 47.34 Tamil Nadu 130058 2948 10321 10356 23625 18.16 Tripura 10486 109 4686 3182 7977 76.04 Uttar Pradesh 240928 1626 4559 8153 14338 5.95 Uttarakhand 53483 4762 14167 5567 24496 45.80 West Bengal 88752 2984 4646 5365 12995 14.64 A&NIslands 8249 3761 2416 547 6724 81.51 Chandigarh 114 1 10 6 17 14.72 Dadra & Nagar   Haveli 491 0 114 97 211 42.97 Daman & Diu 112 0 0.62 5.53 6 5.49 Lakshadweep 32 0 17.18 9.88 27 84.56 Puducherry 480 0 35.37 14.69 50 10.43 Grand Total 3287263 83471 320736 287820 692027 21.05             This was stated by Shrimati Jayanthi Natarajan Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Environment and Forests, in a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha today. The Minister further stated that the Central Government, as on 31.03.2013, accorded 23,367 approvals under the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 for diversion of 11,57,468 hectares of forest land for non-forest purpose. To mitigate impacts of diversion of forest land on the ecology, environment, biodiversity and overall forest cover in the country, the Central Government while according approvals under the Forest (conservation) Act, 1980 for diversion of forest land stipulates appropriate conditions. Important among these are transfer and mutation of equivalent non-forest land in favour of State Forest Department (SFD) for compensatory afforestation from the funds provided by the user agency; notification of such non-forest land transferred in favour of the SFD as Reserved Forest/Protected Forest; realization of the Net Present Value (NPV) of the diverted forest from the user agency for execution of various activities for conservation, protection and management of forests and wildlife; and realization of funds from the user agencies for preparation and execution of appropriate plans for conservation and development of wildlife in and around the forest land proposed to be diverted for non-forest purposes. The Minister further stated that As mentioned in India State of Forest Report-2011, gregarious occurrence of weeds like lantana in forest areas and agricultural crops like sugarcane, cotton, etc. occurring in the vicinity of forest area cause mixing of the spectral signatures and often make precise forest cover delineation difficult. However, Forest Survey of India takes due care for such areas and through extensive ground truthing this error is minimized. As per ISFR-2011 the accuracy of classification of forest cover is 95.23%. RM/RS-  USQ4365 - RS (Release ID :95717)