World Wildlife Day: Concerted efforts needed to increase forest cover in Amritsar: Environmentalists

The World Wildlife Day falling on Monday is an attempt to wake people and the government to save the diminishing forest cover. For district like Amritsar, which has one of the lowest forest areas in the country, environmentalists feel efforts should be made to increase this cover.

The total forest area of Amritsar division, comprising revenue districts of Amritsar and Tarn Taran, is 13898.53 hectares which also includes 8252.29 hectares as strip forests. The total geographical area of both the districts is 5.06 lakh hectares while the total forest area is 13898.53 hectares which constitute around 2.75 per cent of the total geographical area of the two districts.

Gunbir Singh, Chairman, World Wide Fund for Nature-India (WWF India), Punjab, said, “Sixty per cent of the total forest cover in the district is classified under strip forest which cannot be termed as actual forest area. Out of total 2.75 per cent forest cover in Amritsar, 60 per cent is strip forest, which is an eyewash. Unless we redouble efforts, we will have farm denudation, water scarcity and climate catastrophes in future. The writing is on the wall.”

“Climate change is dictating the urgency for reparations against degradation of the forest cover. The future shall see harsher summers and aggressive weather as a consequence of man’s timber mania and his hegemony, cutting and occupying forested zones,” he said.

“We need concerted efforts to actually increase the forest cover area on the ground as the National Forest Policy mandates that 33 per cent of the total geographical area in a state must be under green cover. The state government has already announced its plan to increase the covered forest area in Punjab by 2030.”

There are seven forest ranges in the division namely Amritsar-I, Amritsar-II, Patti, Rayya-I, Rayya-II, Ajnala and Tarn Taran. It is bounded by the international boundary with Pakistan on the West. “The Ravi river on the western side, the Sutlej river on the southern side and the Beas river on the eastern side more or less act as the natural boundaries of the division,” he said.

Environmentalist PS Bhatty said, “Rakh Sarai Amanat Khan with an area of 1,223 acres (489.20 hectare) is the only declared Wild Life Conservation Reserve here. We need to add more forest pockets on this line.”

His Khudai Khidmatgar organisation and several other city-based environmental NGOs have been spearheading sapling plantation drives to make the city green. He felt that rigorous afforestation drives of native plants on government and private lands with participation of public and private stakeholders was required to meet the target.

Officials of the district administration and the Forest Department said after the state government announced its plan to increase the covered forest area in Punjab by 2030, the district received lakhs of saplings last year. Similar efforts would be made next year, he said.