'Forest Report misses the forest for the trees'

Ritwick Dutta is an environmental lawyer and founder of Legal Initiative for Forest and Environment (LIFE) that received the Right Livelihood Award, 2021 (also called the ‘Alternative Nobel Prize’) for innovative legal work empowering communities to protect their resources in the pursuit of environmental democracy in India. He has been involved in environmental litigation for the last two decades. Dutta spoke to DH’s Kalyan Ray on the State of the Forest Report released by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change last week. Excerpts:

The new State of the Forest report shows a drop of 1,582 sq km of moderately dense forest, but gain in dense forest (501 sq km) and open forest (2600 sq km). What does it mean?

Contrary to the title – India State of the Forest Report – this document is not about forests. It misses the forest for the trees. It does not distinguish between natural forest and tree cover in the form of tea, coffee, coconut, palm, sugarcane and fruit-bearing tree plantations. Even agroforestry in the form of eucalyptus, bamboo, poplar or acacia is being counted as forest whereas these types of trees/plantations are clearly excluded even from the dictionary meaning of forest as mandated by the Supreme Court and various expert committees set up by state governments. If one goes by the definition of forest as per the ISFR, the outcome can be dangerous. By simply planting oil palms or coconut on agricultural land or degraded forest, the forest cover can be shown to have increased.

The report shows a gain of more than 500 sq km of dense forests – does natural forest grow so fast? If not, what do you think those canopies are?

As far as the increase in the dense forest is concerned, the report carries little meaning given the fact that even a mango orchard can have a density of more than 40% or even 70%. An increase in the open forest could be a result of deforestation of dense forest areas or even felling or pruning of horticultural trees. It is impossible to come to any conclusion based on such data. The ISFR does not make any distinction between the type of trees and encompasses all types of land irrespective of their ownership and land use. Thus all the tree species along with bamboo, fruit trees, coconut and palm trees have been termed as forest cover’. The 500 sq km could possibly be a coconut or mango plantation and not ‘forest’ at all.

Do you want to mean that the quality of Indian forests can not be determined from the biennial report?

Even within recorded forest areas (Reserved Forest, Protected Forest and Protected Areas), it is not possible to know about the quality of forest cover from the report, which clearly states: Agricultural crops like sugarcane, cotton etc adjacent to forest and occurrence of weeds like lantana within forest areas causes mixing of spectral signatures and often make it difficult to interpret and delineate the forest cover precisely’. To put it bluntly, the FSI Report is not worth the paper on which it is printed if it can’t distinguish natural forests from cotton and sugarcane fields.

The report also shows a drop in tree cover compared to what was achieved in the 2017-19 cycle – what do you think could be the reason as the government has dedicated funds (CAMPA) and programmes for afforestation?

The report gives generalised reasons for such a decrease. No effort has been made to find the exact cause of the same. It would have made sense to compare areas where CAMPA funds have been spent in afforestation and the impact of such an effort.

Why is it that the forest loss is the maximum in the North East? Can shifting cultivation – a traditional practice – be blamed always?

Unfortunately, the report does not identify the reason behind such a decrease. It only lists the reason for the forest loss without examining the gravity of the problem and the damage caused. It states that with respect to the North East, the loss of forest cover and deterioration of forest canopy ‘may be attributed’ to ‘shifting cultivation, felling of trees, natural calamities, anthropogenic pressure and developmental activities’. This conclusion shows the casual manner in which a scientific exercise has been conducted. ‘Felling of trees’ is part of the shifting cultivation; which in turn is part of the anthropogenic pressure. Similarly, development activities lead to the felling of trees which is also a part of the anthropogenic pressure. It was imperative for FSI to have undertaken a detailed analysis of the case of deforestation, given that ISFR is always projected as a report card on India’s performance on increasing forest cover.

Has the government forgotten about the people living in forests? Is the Forest Rights Act being implemented properly?

We must move away from the obsession with ‘dense’ or ‘open forest’. We have moved from looking at forests as a source of ‘timber’ but now seeing them as ‘carbon sink’. In this journey, both people and wild species have been forgotten. Open and scrub forests don’t mean they are of no consequence –they sustain grazing communities, provide firewood and can be used to produce medical herbs and other biological resources. It was imperative for FSI to have done an assessment of the Forest Rights Act and its impact on the regeneration of forests. Unfortunately, a significant part of the report has been devoted to the assessment of forest cover in tiger reserves and lion habitats. Such assessment should be part of the Annual Tiger Estimation Report. Also, if at all wildlife areas were to be mapped, it should have been done for Elephants, given that a significant elephant population exists outside Protected Areas and face a severe anthropogenic threat.