Forest cover goes up by 3.67% in Telangana

Forest Minister A Indrakaran Reddy said on Monday that the forest cover in Telangana had gone up by 3.67 per cent due to the implementation of Telangana Ku Harithaharam Scheme. He said that they had planted 217.406 crore plants in the state so far under the programme.

Replying to questions raised by MLAs during the question hour of the ongoing budget session, he said that the programmes being held by the State government for the protection of environment were yielding good results in the state. He said that the Survey of India had announced that the forest cover had gone up by 3.68 percent in the state . He also said the Food and Agriculture Organisation and the UNO had recognised the State capital as the Tree City of India. He said that as against their target of planting 230 crore plants under the Harithaharam programme, 217.406 crore saplings were planted in the State. Reddy also said that they had shifted their progress on the protection of the plants and added that they had amended Panchayat Raj and Municipal Act to protect 85 per cent of the total plants.

He said that they were allocating 10 per cent as green budget in the annual budget of villages and municipalities to nourish and protect the trees. He said that as against the total geographical area of 2.77 crore of the State, Telangana has 66.66 lakh acres of the forest land. He said that the forest cover constitutes 24.05 percent of the total area of Telangana as against the 21.34 percent forest cover of the country.