Goa to get compensatory afforestation funds

NEW DELHI, AUG 17
The first installment of funds under the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) will be disbursed to eight states in the country, including Goa, on Tuesday. Other states that have opened their CAMPA accounts include Uttarakhand, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Sikkim, Dadra & Nagar Haveli, and Assam.
Speaking at the meeting of Principal Chief Conservator of Forests and Chief Wildlife wardens in New Delhi today, Union Minister of State for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh said the forest sector is getting an historic opportunity to get funds from six different channels.
Apart from CAMPA there is NAREGA, Intensification of Infrastructure Management, traditional National Afforestation Programme, Integrated Development of Wildlife Habitats, etc. Besides regeneration of forests, this amount can be used for human resources development, recruitments of new posts, data management, etc, he said.
It is the state that has to decide how much of funds it can absorb for regeneration and betterment of forests and allied sectors, the Minister said.
He also appealed to Forest Departments come out of the mindset of bringing 33 per cent of geographical area under forests.
He said that states should now concentrate on regeneration, so that degraded forest is transformed to medium density forest cover, medium density forest areas becomes high density areas, and high density forest areas are conserved and preserved, so that they turn into heavy carbon sinks.
Presentations were made on the Forest Conservation Act,1980, New Scheme Initiatives, Strategies for Increasing Forest and tree Cover, Tribal Rights Act and Wildlife Conservation.