Ques: According to India State of Forest Report 2015, which one of the following state has increased it’s forest area?
(a) Kerala
(b) Madhya Pradesh
(c) Tamil Nadu
(d) Chhattisgarh
Ans: (c)
Related fatcs:
- On December 4, 2015 14th edition of the India State of Forest Report released by Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Shri Prakash Javadekar.
- According to report India’s forest and tree cover has increased by 5,081 sq km.
- The key facts of the report are as follows:
- Forest cover of the country as per this assessment is 701,673 sq. km which is 21.34 percent of the geographical area of the country.
- The tree cover of the country is estimated to be 92,572 sq. km which is 2.82 percent of the geographical area.
- The total forest and tree cover of the country as per this assessment is 794,245 sq. km which is 24.16 percent of the geographical area of the country.
- There is an increase of 3,775 sq. km in the forest cover of the country as compare to 2013 assessment.
- In hill and tribal districts of the country, there is net increase of forest cover of 1,680 sq. km and 438 sq. km respectively as compare to the previous assessment.
- The North Eastern states of India account for one fourth of the country’s forest cover. There is net decline of 628 sq. km in forest cover as compare to the previous assessment.
- Mangroves cover has increase by 112 sq. km as compare to the previous assessment.
- The total carbon stock in the country’s forest is estimated to be 7,044 million tones, an increase of 103 million tonnes, which is an increase of 1.48 in percentage terms over the previous assessments.
- The maximum increase in forest cover has been observed in Tamil Nadu – 2,501 sq km, followed by Kerala – 1,317 sq km and Jammu & Kashmir – 450 sq km.
- Madhya Pradesh has the largest forest cover of 77,462 sq km in the country, followed by Arunachal Pradesh, with a forest cover of 67,248 sq km and Chhattisgarh – 55,586 sq km. Mizoram, with 88.93 percentage of forest cover has the highest forest cover in percentage terms, followed by Lakshadweep with 84.56 per cent.
- Out of these, 7 States/Union Territories – Mizoram, Lakshadweep, Andaman & Nicobar Island, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Meghalaya and Manipur have more than 75 per cent forest cover.
- Tripura, Goa, Sikkim, Kerala, Uttarakhand, Dadra & Nagar Haveli, Chhattisgarh and Assam have forest cover is between 33 percent to 75 percent.
Reference:
http://pib.nic.in/newsite/erelease.aspx
http://fsi.nic.in/isfr-2015/isfr-2015-executive-summary.pdf