CHENNAI: India has set an ambitious target to restore 26 million hectares of forest land and create 2.5-3 billion tonnes of additional carbon sinks, said Bivash Ranjan, additional director general of forests (ADGF), Union Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change, on the eve of the fourth meeting of the G20 Environment and Climate Sustainability Working Group in Chennai.
‘Land degradation, ecosystem restoration, biodiversity and water resources’ is one of three thematic priorities of the fourth working group, which was underway on Tuesday and attended by a record number of delegates. Its ministerial meeting scheduled on July 28 will be attended by 225 delegates.
Replying to a question from The New Indian Express, Bivash Ranjan said 27 per cent of India’s forest area is impacted by wild forest fires and the natural regeneration was not happening. Also, India has reclaimed 38 per cent of forest area lost to mining and the target was to reclaim the remaining 62 per cent.
“These degraded areas are originally biodiversity-rich landscapes. We have to restore and take care of them. The G20 Global Land Initiative (GLI) was launched during the Saudi presidency and the ambition of this initiative was to prevent, halt and reverse land degradation and reduce degraded land by 50 per cent by 2040. GLI will monitor whether the land is restored or not. However, India voluntarily has created structural and functional tools to monitor the restoration and institutes like Indian Institute of Forest Management to do the monitoring and submit a report,” Bivash said.
He said this G20 working group meeting was the first after the adoption of the historic Kunming Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. India by committing to restore 26 million hectares by 2030 is achieving two objectives: increasing the biodiversity and fulfilling the goals set in the Global Biodiversity Framework.
Environment policy
The fourth ECSWG meeting will also see the launch of ‘Resource Efficiency Circular Economy Industry Coalition’ by Bhupender Yadav, Union Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change, on July 27, according to Naresh Pal Gangwar, additional secretary to the ministry.