Forest funds become milch cow

The Pioneer , Monday, June 25, 2012
Correspondent : Moushumi Basu
From providing broadband connectivity to DFOs to meeting expenses incurred on CAMPA workshop held in Hotel Ashok in Delhi to mitigation of electrocution of jumbos in Odisha by maintenance of power lines, the funds are used for purposes other than afforestation.

The minutes of the last meeting of the National CAMPA Advisory Council (NCAC), chaired by the Environment Minister Jayanthi Natarajan, is a grim pointer to the above.

The application of CAMPA funds for such non-forestry purposes has worried the experts, especially when the issues of climate change mitigation through efficient carbon sequestration by natural forests were deliberated upon at length in the Rio+20 summit.

The Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) is the custodian of these funds to be disbursed to States. Further, the July 2009 orders of the Supreme Court also explicitly direct the use of CAMPA funds for the purpose of consolidation of forests. In fact, one of the NCAC members, Prof NH Ravindranath, even pointed out that efforts should be made to use CAMPA funds in properly worked-out schemes aimed at increasing bio-diversity.

At the last NCAC meeting recently, while voicing for a greater role of the Forest Survey of India (FSI), Prof Ravindranath said that the proposals funded under the CAMPA lacked quality. He cited how even clonal plantations were being taken up which were not in tandem with the spirit of the CAMPA guidelines.

“It is for the FSI to play a greater role in the matter of monitoring of works undertaken under the CAMPA,” he stressed.

The experts, pointing to the minutes of the meeting, expressed shock as to how the Chairperson (Environment Minister) could agree to the proposal of providing broadband connectivity to DFOs with the CAMPA funds.

The copy of the minutes state: “The chairperson desired that the Principal Chief Conservators of Forests of all States should be requested to send to the ad-hoc CAMPA, the list of Divisional Forest Officers who did not have broadband connectivity, within the next two weeks. The information will thereupon be transmitted to the National Informatics Centre.”

Intriguingly, while the meeting dropped the proposal of a National Forestry Knowledge Forum, it decided to examine the proposal for allocation of CAMPA funds for taking mitigative measures to prevent death of elephants due to electrocution and for which proper maintenance of power distribution lines was necessary. The proposal of the Arunachal Pradesh Government for the “Agri-horti-silvicultural Scheme” too was termed ineligible for CAMPA funding,

Though the chairperson said, “It was improper to push all expenditure to the CAMPA”, the forest heads present in the meeting called for senior officers to be provided with vehicles and communication facilities, as they are required to tour extensively in their jurisdiction.

Former member of National Board for Wildlife (NBWL) Praveen Bhargav said that when States are going in a big way for soft loans from multi-lateral institutions such as the World Bank and Japanese Bank for International Co-operation for plantation projects, why is this huge corpus of Rs 25,000 crore not being utilised for eliminating fragmentation which has been scientifically identified as the biggest threat to biodiversity.

“Compensatory afforestation through plantation is not an antidote for forest loss due to development projects. Habitat consolidation through acquisition of critical parcels of land in the midst of large forest blocks is perhaps the most worthwhile way to use CAMPA funds,” he felt.

Fooling Away

In a clear violation of July 2009 SC orders, Campa funds being misused on:

• Broadband connectivity for DFOs

• Providing vehicles and communication facilities to senior officials

• Expenditure incurred on the CAMPA workshop held in Hotel Ashok

• Mitigation of electrocution of jumbos in Odisha by maintenance of power lines

 
SOURCE : http://www.dailypioneer.com/home/online-channel/360-todays-newspaper/75410-forest-funds-become-milch-cow.html
 


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