The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : ‘Support of local people crucial in forest management’

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Sep 19, 2007
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

‘Support of local people crucial in forest management’

Special Correspondent

— Photo: K. Gopinathan

SHARING THOUGHTS: Minister for Forests C. Chenningappa (second from right) speaking to A.K. Varma (right), Principal Chief Conservator of Forests at the conference of forest researchers and scientists working in southern States in Bangalore on Tuesday.

BANGALORE: The Principal Secretary to the Government, Department of Forest and Ecology, Abhijit Dasgupta, has said that a sustainable management of forests would remain incomplete without the active participation of local people.

Mr. Dasgupta was delivering the presidential address at the inaugural session of a two-day conference of forest researchers and scientists working in southern States on “present research activities and future vision” here on Tuesday.

In the past, the word management was synonymous with exploitation. With the passage of time, the term had come to denote regeneration of forests with sound techniques and technological support. Enhancing biomass production was vital in that context, he said.

Delivering the keynote address, the Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Evaluation, Working Plan, Research and Training), B.K. Singh, said that want of institutional structure and the infrastructure in the forest departments had been hampering the quality of forest research. This should be addressed with a proper perspective on priority.

The research programmes should be evolved to meet the changing management objectives. This would enable researchers face the new challenges, including the data demands of the forest management effectively, he said.

The departmental research wings in a majority of the States had been focussing mainly on “adaptive research agenda” such as regeneration technique, provenance trial, nursery techniques and plantation management. A huge information gap between the forest management and forestry research had not been addressed, Mr. Singh said.

Minister for Forest and Ecology C. Chennigappa said the State forests had a repository of over 4,500 species of flowering plants, 600 species of birds, 800 species of fishes, 160 species of reptiles, 180 species of mammals and 70 species of amphibians.

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