The Telangana government has set a new trend to other states in the country by reclaiming 8.2 percent of lost greenery in the state within six years. The forest cover now increased by 8.2 percent, thanks to the initiatives such as Haritha Haram, Urban Forestry, Village Parks, and avenue plantation in rural areas among others.
The Telangana state has a total extent of 112.08 lakh hectares of land during bifurcation and had 18.4 percent of forest of the total land. It was supposed to have 33.33 percent of the forest but illegal felling and unauthorized encroachments and other reasons reduced the forest cover to just 18.4 percent. Sensing the seriousness of the problem, the Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao came up with a series of initiatives that yielded satisfactory results though not up to the expectations. However, the state government still continues its efforts. So far it has spent Rs 6,556 crores and raised 239 crore saplings. This resulted in increasing green cover in 1.85 lakh hectares taking the state’s total forest cover to 26.6 percent.
Image Courtesy: http://forests.telangana.gov.in/