PANJIM: With little more than a month left to meet the Bombay High Court at Goa’s July 30 deadline for filing a compliance report on tree census, the State Forest Department has got a herculean task to cover whopping around 3.9 crore trees under geo-enabled tree census data.
As on April 30, 2023, the department has managed to map only two per cent- 7,43,410 trees out of the total 3.17 crore trees spread over in about 2,482 square km area.
On an average, 61,950 trees are mapped monthly in last one year- since April 2022.
From April 2022 to December 31, 2022, a total of 3,62,035 trees were mapped.
Of the total, 7,43,410 trees that are geo-tagged, 4,73,763 are in South Goa while another 2,69,647 are in North.
After being repeatedly slammed by the Court for their lackadaisical behaviour towards its order dated back in July 2021, the State forest department had begun the exercise of tree census as mandated under the Goa, Daman, and Diu Preservation of Trees Act, 1984 (Trees Act) in April, last year. The census is likely to entail expenditure of Rs 89 crore.
Total 130 teams across 12 of North and South Goa have been tasked with the job.
As per the forest department each tree has been tagged with a unique ID along with attributes like latitude, longitude, botanical name, common name, local name, height, girth, condition, ownership and location.
A senior forest department Official involved in the task explained that with limited manpower, we have to identify each tree as per its species, varieties, stem diametre and other features of trees. “It is not an easy task. We have to cover entire Goa and each and every tree. We might seek for further extension in time from the Court,” official said.
Since 1987, the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) prepares forest cover report every three years, which includes everything- tree cover and extent of green cover outside forest areas and hence there is no need for a separate State-based census.
