Forest cover
Government has taken a lot of initiatives at the village level to restore the green cover in Jammu and Kashmir. In this direction a recent forest survey report has said that there is a lot of increase in the forest cover of Jammu and Kashmir.
The government recently said that 1.35 crore plantations have been targeted for the year 2022-23, of which, 26.50 lakh saplings will be planted with active involvement of Village Panchayat Plantation Committees (VPPCs) to create green assets in the Gram Panchayats.
To ensure widespread people’s participation in government-sponsored plantation drives, the government is adopting a multi-disciplinary convergence model linking school-level eco clubs, Village Panchayat Plantation Committees and MGNREGA works to various plantation and protection drives.
The biggest achievement under Har Gaon Hariyali is that a massive convergence programme is taking place by dovetailing funds under MG-NREGA and the afforestation programme of the forest department.
Under low-cost mode of greening and increasing the forest and tree cover, more than 50 lakh seeds/grass-slips are likely to be planted during the year 2022-23.
NITI Aayog in its `State Energy and Climate Index’ report has revealed that Jammu and Kashmir has 94.5 tonnes of carbon stock per hectare of forest land while Andaman and Nicobar tops the list with 96.4 tons of carbon stock per hectare.
