Find firms that’ll remove invasive species as CSR: Madras HC

CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Thursday directed the State government to identify private companies that wish to volunteer and pump in CSR funds to remove invasive species from forest areas. A division bench of Justices N Sathish Kumar and D Bharatha Chakravarthy outrightly rejected the government’s status report, calling it a “piece-meal approach”.

“If forests were generating revenue like Tasmac, then there would be urgent attention. Unfortunately, forests don’t generate such revenue,” observed Justice Sathish Kumar, expressing his displeasure. The bench said with the current manpower and funds released by the State, the forest department may find it difficult to remove or control the growth of invasive species.

The court directed the State to identify willing companies and allot them some area to remove these species using their CSR funds. In the status report, the government claimed Tamil Nadu Newsprint and Paper Limited was willing to clear a specific variety of invasive species.

“If that is the case, what is the difficulty in allowing TNPL to carry out removal,” the bench said, and asked for the status of Expression of Interest called for earlier, to which Additional Advocate General J Ravindran, representing the State, had no answer.

The court scheduled the next hearing for July 25, and told the government to submit a detailed action plan with details of areas and extent of invasive species removed. Tamil Nadu, including the Western Ghats, is among the chief invasion hotspots in India.

A recent compendium of plants of Tamil Nadu recorded a total of 6,723 taxa (species), 2,459 are non-native alien species, comprising nearly 36.6% of the State’s flora. An expert committee formed by the Madurai Bench of the court, sent a questionnaire to all forest divisions to report their estimates at the range level of the area under 17 listed invasive alien species.

According to its report, the area under five major invasive alien species alone is estimated to be 268,100 hectares. Lantana camara was found in 1,85,000 ha, Prosopis juliflora (56,000 ha), Acacia mearnsii (wattle, 22,400 ha), Senna spectabilis (2,400 ha), and Opuntia sp. (2,300 ha). Meanwhile, the Invasive Alien Species Policy drafting committee said the area infested would be 3,18,000 ha.

If only forests generate revenue like Tasmac: HC
If forests were generating revenue like Tasmac, then there would be urgent attention. Unfortunately, forests don’t generate such revenue,” observed Justice Sathish Kumar. The court outrightly rejected the government’s status report