ICFRE to submit plan on mining rehab

Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education will submit a model plan on mining rehabilitation and reclamation for Bellary, Chitradurga and Tumkur districts to the Supreme Court and the state government by January 20, a top ICFRE official said here on Saturday.

"ICFRE has already submitted its report on macro level Environment Impact Assessment of iron ore mining areas of these three districts to the Supreme Court as per its directions and will submit a model plan on mining rehabilitation and reclamation to the Apex Court and the state government by January 20", Director General ICFRE V K Bahuguna told reporters here on Saturday.

The plan will also focus on sustainable mining. He said the advanced centre for mining rehabilitation, set up in Oct 2011 to undertake systematic study on the topic, would take up scientific studies to develop environment management plan to rehabilitate degraded mining areas in the state, he said. ICFRE has suggested a feasibility study for underground mining as done in Stockholm in Sweden, Bahuguna said.

Highlighting the need to increase investment in forestry and forest management, he said Joint Forest Management (JFM) Programmes has already been taken up in 29 states,representing 1,18,213 JFM committees protecting about 22.93 million hectares forests.

Bahuguna said JFM has increased availability of forest resources,created employment opportunity and bettered the flow of ecosystem services. He said agroforestry is a land-use system integrating agriculture, trees, people and animals in the same space, resulting in improved soil quality, higher yields and improved standards of living.

Bahuguna said eight lakh hectares out of 38 lakh hectares of the total forest area in Karnataka which constitutes 21 per cent is under JFM, adding there are 3,848 JFM committees working in the state.

"The annual benefit to the state from JFM is estimated to be Rs 3,144 lakh. Karnataka ranks seventh in the country in JFM while the first three positions are occupied by Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Chattisgarh," he said. Fringe forest is another important area on which ICFRE has recently taken up a project on "Fringe area development for fodder, fuel wood and small timber" funded by the National Rainfed Authority of India, he said. The contributions of ICFRE to national development are now compiled in a book titled "Forestry in the Service of Nation: ICFRE Technologies", Bahuguna said.