Editorial 1. The case for open, verifiable forest cover data
Context:
- India is one of the few countries to have a scientific system of periodic forest cover assessment that provides “valuable inputs for planning, policy formulation and evidence-based decision-making”.
- Since 19.53% in the early 1980s, India’s forest cover has increased to 21.71% in 2021. Adding to this a notional 2.91% tree cover estimated in 2021, the country’s total green cover now stands at 24.62%, on paper
Forest and tree cover
- While the Forest Survey of India (FSI) started publishing its biennial State of Forest reports in 1987, it has been mapping India’s forest cover since the early 1980s.
- India counts, The 'Forest Cover' refers to all tree patches that have canopy density of more than 10% and area of one hectare or more in size, irrespective of land use, legal status and ownership. It may include orchards, bamboo, and palms etc. and is assessed through remote sensing.
- This disregards the United Nation’s benchmark that does not include areas predominantly under agricultural and urban land use in forests.
- The 'Recorded Forest Area' or 'Forest Area' refers to all the geographical areas recorded as 'Forests' in government records irrespective of the actual trees growing on such lands. RFA mainly comprises of Reserved Forests (RF) and Protected Forests (PF) and Unclassed Forests notified under Indian Forest Act, 1927 or respective State Forest Acts.
NRSA versus FSI
- The National Remote Sensing Agency (NRSA) under the Department of Space estimated India’s forest cover using satellite imagery for periods 1971-1975 and 1980-1982 to report a loss of 2.79% from 16.89% to 14.10% in just seven years.
- While reliable data on encroachment is unavailable, government records show that 42,380 sq km nearly the size of Haryanaof forest land was diverted for non-forest use between 1951 and 1980.
- However, the government was reluctant to accept such a massive loss and, after much negotiations, the NRSA and the newly established FSI “reconciled” India’s forest cover at 19.53% in 1987.
- Significantly, the FSI did not contest the NRSA finding that the dense forest cover had fallen from 14.12% in the mid-1970s to 10.96% in 1981, and reconciled it to 10.88% in 1987.
Old forests lost
- In India, land recorded as forest in revenue records or proclaimed as forest under a forest law is described as Recorded Forest Area.
- These areas were recorded as forests at some point due to the presence of forests on the land. Divided into Reserved, Protected and Unclassed forests, Recorded Forest Areas account for 23.58% of India.
- Over time, some of these Recorded Forest Areas lost forest cover due to encroachment, diversion, forest fire etc. And tree cover improved in many places outside the Recorded Forest Areas due to agro-forestry, orchards etc.
- In 2011, when the FSI furnished data on India’s forest cover inside and outside Recorded Forest Areas, it came to light that nearly one-third of Recorded Forest Areas had no forest at all. In other words, almost one-third of India’s old natural forests — over 2.44 lakh sq km (larger than Uttar Pradesh) or 7.43% of India were already gone.
Natural forests shrink
- Even after extensive plantation by the forest department since the 1990s, dense forests within Recorded Forest Areas added up to cover only 9.96% of India in 2021. That is a one-tenth slide since the FSI recorded 10.88% dense forest in 1987.
- This loss remains invisible due to the inclusion of commercial plantations, orchards, village homesteads, urban housings etc as dense forests outside Recorded Forest Areas.
- The SFR 2021, for example, reports 12.37% dense forest by including random green patches
Natural vs manmade: The steady replacement of natural forests with plantations are worrisome.
- First, natural forests have evolved naturally to be diverse and, therefore, support a lot more biodiversity. Simply put, it has many different plants to sustain numerous species.
- Secondly, plantation forests have trees of the same age, are more susceptible to fire, pests and epidemics, and often act as a barrier to natural forest regeneration.
- Thirdly, natural forests are old and therefore stock a lot more carbon in their body and in the soil. In 2018, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) flagged India’s assumption that new forests (plantations) reach the carbon stock level of existing forests in just eight years.
- On the other hand, plantations can grow a lot more and faster than old natural forests. This also means that plantations can achieve additional carbon targets faster. But compared to natural forests, plantations are often harvested more readily, defeating carbon goals in the long term.
Way forward/ Open, participatory
- The FSI compares some interpreted data with the corresponding reference data collected from the ground under the National Forest Inventory (NFI) programme.
- In 2021, it claimed to have established an overall accuracy of 95.79% in identifying forests from non-forests. However, given the limited resources, the exercise was limited to less than 6,000 sample points.
- Yet, the FSI never made its data freely available for public scrutiny. Inexplicably, It also bars the media from accessing its geo-referenced maps.
- “In 1995, we shifted to our own satellite. The forest maps are based on the images purchased from NRSA, another arm of the government.
- As in Brazil, Forest are losing at an alarming rate. But whatever be the quality, their forest data is open and free,” a former Environment ministry official said.
- Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research (INPE) maintains an open web platform, TerraBrasilis, for queries, analysis and dissemination of data on deforestation, forest cover change and forest fire.
- Since lack of manpower limits the FSI’s scope for verifying the quality of remotely sensed data in the field, making the field data freely available to the public may also ease its burden.
- Therefore, India’s Forest data should be available online to better participation and scrutiny which will represent the better picture of forest conservation and protection.
Editorial 2. Cities that withstand
Recent Context:
- Recently, the destruction caused by earthquakes in Turkey should be alarming for us. Over the last three weeks, tremors have been felt in Meghalaya and in the region around Joshimath and Chamoli in Uttarakhand.
- Moreover, geologists have warned of a probable massive earthquake in the Himalayan state.
- In this context, we should pay serious attention to the observations made by the Delhi High Court on February 16. The court, while hearing a petition, asked the state government to file a status report and action plan on the structural safety of buildings in Delhi.
- Nearly 58 per cent of the Indian landmass is vulnerable to earthquakes and the concerns that have been raised by the court need a policy response to handle the situation like Turkey.
Current, India’s policy on earthquake and issues related to it:
- Currently, India’s policy on earthquake preparedness operates primarily at the scale of structural details. Guided by the National Building Codes, this includes specifying dimensions of the structural members columns, beams, etc. and details of the reinforcements that join these elements together.
- While scientifically sound, this view on earthquake preparedness is myopic.
- First, it ignores the buildings that were constructed before such codes were published in 1962. Such buildings form a large part of our cities.
- Second, it assumes infallibility in the processes of enforcement relying only on penalisation and illegalities.
- Third, it treats earthquakes as a problem of individual buildings — as if they exist and behave in complete isolation from their urban context.
- The truth is that buildings exist in clusters and in the event of an earthquake, behave as a system. They collapse on nearby buildings and on the abutting streets damaging buildings that might have otherwise survived and blocking evacuation routes.
- Earthquake preparedness, therefore, needs to act at the scale of building details as well as that of cities. Moreover, we must think about it in the realm of policy and not just legal enforcement.
Certain areas to be included in India’s policy on earthquake
- lack a comprehensive policy. On retrofitting existing structures
- At the scale of building details, we need to create a system of retrofitting existing structures and enforcing seismic codes with more efficiency.
- Such a policy should include two measures.
- First, to create a system of tax-based or development rights-based incentives for retrofitting one’s building up to seismic codes. Such a system of incentives will enable the growth of an industry around retrofitting and will generate a body of well-trained professionals and competent organisations.
- And second, by ensuring better enforcement of seismic codes through a similar model.
- A step forward in this direction was the National Retrofitting Programme launched in 2014. Under the programme, the Reserve Bank of India directed banks to deny loans for any building activity that does not meet the standards of earthquake-resistant design. Carrots, however, will work better than sticks.
We can learn from the world:
- Cases like that of Japan and San Francisco are good examples in this regard. Japan has invested heavily in technological measures to mitigate the damage from the frequent earthquakes that it experiences.
- Skyscrapers are built with counterweights and other high-tech provisions to minimise the impact of tremors. Small houses are built on flexible foundations and public infrastructure is integrated with automated triggers that cut power, gas, and water lines during earthquakes.
- All of this has been a result of cultivating an industry around earthquake mitigation and fostering expertise.
- San Francisco implemented policy changes similar to Japan’s and when the next major earthquake hit in 1989, the city recorded just 63 casualties.
Smart Cities Mission should have urban policy for earthquake preparedness.
- An urban-level policy should start with surveys and audits that can generate earthquake vulnerability maps showing parts of the city that are more prone to serious damage. This should follow four criteria.
- First, the percentage of vulnerable structures in the area;
- second, the availability of evacuation routes and distances from the nearest open ground;
- third, density of the urban fabric; and fourth, location of nearest relief services and the efficiency with which these services can reach affected sites.
- Using such maps, enforcement, incentives, and response centres can be proportionally distributed across the urban terrain. Flood zone mapping is a good example of such an exercise that has proven to be successful in terms of timely evacuation and efficient implementation.
Way Forward: A policy on earthquake preparedness will require a visionary, radical and transformative approach.
- First, some areas such as dense historic city centres will still be beyond repair. They will require either surgical retrofitting or revised town planning schemes. The former is unreliable and the latter, politically suicidal and damaging to history, and these approaches, therefore, are unlikely to be successful.
- There is need for Political will : People across time and space have been in denial of such threats and, therefore, we lack political will to execute such transformations. Earthquakes have not been seen as a fatal threat until they are.
- After the 2001 Bhuj earthquake, for example, the Gujarat government immediately adapted new town planning schemes that widened roads and created routes for evacuation and relief work.
- Therefore, there is need for inclusion of an earthquake preparedness policy in urban renewal programmes such as the Smart Cities Mission. It would be unwise to wait for another earthquake to learn how to be better prepared for one.