FOREST COVER OF THE STATE OF GOA Rajya Sabha
The forest cover of the state of Goa, as per 2005 assessment made by Forest Survey of India (FSI) is 2,164 km2. The State Government is making all out efforts to restock the degraded Forest areas under various scheme of the State Government, Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS) and under Compensatory Afforestation. Seedlings are also distributed to the general public, farmers, NGO's etc. on nominal payment or free of cost to plant over the waste land, vacant land and fallow land. Besides, the Forest Department is also supplying free seedlings to Panchayat, Schools, Colleges, Educational Institutions to encourage mass plantation during Vanamahotsav.
First time the assessment of forest cover was done in the state only in 1987 which was 1,240 km2 and in 2005 it has been recorded at 2,164 km2. The increase is mainly on account of technological developments as smaller patches and cashew/coconut plantations are also included in the assessment.
To improve the forest cover on the country the Ministry has taken various steps like National Afforestation Programme (NAP) through the Forest Development Agencies (FDA) at the forest division level and the Joint Forest Management Committees at the village level, launching of Grants-in-Aid for Greening India Scheme in Tenth Plan to augment production and use of Quality Planting Material (QPM), initiation of a new Scheme, Gram Van Yojana (GVY for afforestation on non-forest lands involving PRIs. An allocation of Rs. 900 crores has been made in the Eleventh Plan.
Forest Survey of India (FSI) uses remote sensing technology wherein satellite data is interpreted and then ground verification is done. The last forest cover assessment pertains to 2005, the results of which were published in 'State of Forest Report 2005' in February 2008.
This information was given by the Minister of State for Environment & Forests, Shri S. Regupathy, in a written reply to a question by Shri Shantaram Laxman Naik in the Rajya Sabha today.
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