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Summary
Compensatory Afforestation (CA) is a process meant to compensate for the loss of forests to mining, industries, infrastructure, and other projects. It mainly involves the establishment of tree plantations on degraded forest areas and on non-forest lands under common and individual ownership and use. Apart from the costs for compensatory plantations, the government also collects the net present value (NPV) of ‘diverted’ forests and a range of other funds from companies and government departments who use public forest lands for non-forest activities.
The funds for CA collected from private and public corporations are channeled to the forest bureaucracy. Problematically, this cuts out the role of Gram Sabhas who have the right to manage and conserve these forests, and who represent those most harmed by deforestation. Additionally, this model of ecological regeneration proceeds on the flawed assumption that ecologically biodiverse and life-supporting forests can be replaced through monoculture plantations.
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The Forest Department’s own internal reports as well as CAG reports have pointed out the abysmal performance of the Forest Department in utilizing these CA funds. Researchers have also widely documented the rampant dispossession of forest-dwelling communities from their customary lands due to CA plantations, and the failure of CA as a model for ecological restoration.
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The time-lapse satellite imagery of the plantation sites included in this website are drawn from the e-Green Watch website of the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (http://egreenwatch.nic.in/). This satellite imagery demonstrates that CA plantations are routinely set up on agricultural, habitable or common lands of forest-dwelling communities, and even on naturally-occuring dense forests. CA sites are often monoculture plantations of commercial species, which are highly destructive of the natural biodiversity, and threaten the nutritional and livelihood needs of communities. In addition, large amounts of CA funds are misutilized, as reflected in the unreasonably high cost per samplings in several sites, and 'ghost' and failed plantations.
Already functional on an ad hoc basis pursuant to Supreme Court Guidelines, the Parliament ultimately passed the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Act, 2016 amid protests by forest rights and environmental groups. To date, more than Rs.50,000 crores ($7B) and counting have been accumulated under the CA funds and vested with the Forest Department to the exclusion of indigenous communities. The CAF Act and draft Rules endorse the existing flawed model of CA, in violation of the Forest Rights Act, the SC/S Prevention of Atrocities Act, PESA, V Schedule of the Constitution, in addition to causing large-scale ecological destruction.
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