Odisha creates 2,600 acres land bank for compensatory afforestation

Odisha govt has created a land bank of around 26,000 acres of land for Compensatory Afforestation (CA) across the state, official sources said.

The Odisha government has created a land bank of around 26,000 acres of land for Compensatory Afforestation (CA) across the state, official sources said.

Additional Chief Secretary, Revenue and Disaster Management, S Sahu informed a meeting chaired by Chief Secretary S C Mohapatra here on Wednesday that around 26,500 acres of degraded revenue forest land were identified in 18 districts during the month of January, 2022.

The districts where land bank for deforestation is identified are - Keonjhar, Sundargarh, Bolangir, Jajpur, Mayurbhanj, Balasore, Sambalpur, Angul, Cuttack, Dhenkanal, Ganjam, Jagatsinghpur, Jharsuguda, Malkangiri, Nabrangpur, Nuapada, Subarnapur and Nayagarh, Sahu said.

He said tribial dominated Keonjhar district tops the list with identification of around 10,800 acres of land identified in a month. Stating that the target was fixed to increase the size of the land bank to 50,000 acres by March, 2022, he said, it has been decided to bring 1 lakh acre of land for the land bank for CA within a year.

It was decided in the meeting that the Additional Chief Secretary Revenue and Disaster Management Department would be the Nodal Officer for allotment of land for compensatory afforestation. The executing agencies of the developmental projects would approach the Additional District Magistrate (Revenue) of the concerned district for demarcation of land for CA out of the land bank.

Old forest issues in the housing areas of Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA) and Odisha State Housing Board (OSHB) were resolved in a high level meeting here.

Considering different dimensions of the problems encountered by people who lived in Barmunda, Paikanagar, Kanana Vihar and Jayadev Vihar areas in the state capital from 1970s, Mohapatra directed BDA to complete the forest diversion proposals in a month.

He also directed to undertake compensatory afforestation (CA) against the forest land to be diverted. ADM Cuttack and DFO Athagarh were asked to demarcate the land for CA out of the land already identified by the Revenue and Disaster Management Department.