Subject: Conservation & Mitigation

The Chhattisgarh government has become the only second state in the country to recognize the Community Forest Resource (CFR) rights of a village inside a national park.

What is the news?

• The CFR rights of tribals living in a hamlet inside the Kanger Ghati National Park in Bastar district, were recognised.
• It gave the community the power to formulate rules for forest use.

Try this PYQ first:

Q.Under the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006, who shall be the authority to initiate the process for determining the nature and extent of individual or community forest rights or both?

(a) State Forest Department

(b) District Collector/Deputy Commissioner

(c) Tahsildar/Block Development Officer/Mandal Revenue Officer

(d) Gram Sabha

 

 

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What is a Community Forest?

• The community forest resource area is the common forest land that has been traditionally protected and conserved for sustainable use by a particular community.
• The community uses it to access resources available within the traditional and customary boundary of the village; and for seasonal use of landscape in case of pastoralist communities.
• Each CFR area has a customary boundary with identifiable landmarks recognised by the community and its neighboring villages.
• It may include forest of any category – revenue forest, classified & unclassified forest, deemed forest, DLC land, reserve forest, protected forest, sanctuary and national parks etc.

Legal basis for Community Forest Resource (CFR) rights

• The CFR rights are acknowledged under the Section 3(1) (i) of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act.
• This is commonly referred to as the Forest Rights Act or the FRA.
• It aims to provide for recognition of the right to “protect, regenerate or conserve or manage” the community forest resource.
• These rights allow the community to formulate rules for forest use by itself and others and thereby discharge its responsibilities under Section 5 of the FRA.

Nature of rights included

• CFR rights, along with Community Rights (CRs) under Sections 3(1)(b) and 3(1)(c), which include: nistar rights and rights over non-timber forest products, ensure sustainable livelihoods of the community.
• ‘Nistar’ means the concession granted for removal from forest coupes (small trees) on payment at stipulated rates, specified forest produce for bonafide domestic use, but not for barter or sale.
• These rights give the authority to the Gram Sabha to adopt local traditional practices of forest conservation and management within the community forest resource boundary.

Why is the recognition of CFR rights important?

• Aimed at undoing the “historic injustice” meted out to forest-dependent communities due to curtailment of their customary rights over forests, the FRA came into force in 2008.
• It is important as it recognises the community’s right to use, manage and conserve forest resources, and to legally hold forest land that these communities have used for cultivation and residence.
• It also underlines the integral role that forest dwellers play in the sustainability of forests and in the conservation of biodiversity.
• It is of greater significance inside protected forests like national parks, sanctuaries and tiger reserves as traditional dwellers then become a part of management of the protected forests.

How many CFR certificates have been given in Chhattisgarh?

• According to state government officials, Chhattisgarh has recognised nearly 4,000 CFR rights in the state.
• Kanger Ghati National Park is the second national park, after Simlipal in Odisha, where CFR rights have been recognised.

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Experts in Punjab has said that System of Rice Intensification (SRI) Technique is beneficial for the soil, environment and farmers at par with the Direct Seeding of Rice (DSR) technique.

What is SRI technique?

• SRI was first developed in Madagascar in the 1980s and since then several countries in the world have been practising it, including India.
• It promises to save 15 to 20% ground water, improves rice productivity, which is almost at a stagnant point now.
• Experts said that it gives equal or more produce than the conventional rice cultivation, with less water, less seed and less chemicals.
• The net effect is a substantial reduction in the investments on external inputs.

How does it take place in the field and in which soil?

• First, the field is prepared by ploughing.
• It should be laser levelled before transplanting for proper water management and efficiency for a good crop stand.
• Then irrigation is applied in the field which is not a flooding of field like traditional methods but less than that of a well irrigated field.
• Then 10-12 days old nursery (young paddy plants) along with soil particles around the root with minimum disturbance to the roots are transplanted in lines.
• They are marked at a distance of 10 inches from each other with the help of a rope meter.

Benefits over DSR technique

• Unlike DSR, which is suitable only for mid to heavy textured soils, SRI is suitable in all types of soil including less fertile soil as in such soil the number of seedlings can be increased to double.
• Under SRI 2kg seed is required to grow a nursery for one acre against 5kg seed required in the traditional method.

Does the SRI method require continuous flooding after transplantation of nursery?

• In traditional sowing from the day of transplanting till the crop turns 35-40 days fields are kept under flood-like conditions.
• And then fields are filled every week till a few weeks before harvesting.
• But SRI doesn’t require continuous flooding, it needs intermittent irrigation.
• Indeed the plants’ roots should not be starved for oxygen through flooding.
• Irrigation is given to maintain soil moisture near saturation initially, and water is added to the field when the surface soil develops hairline cracks.

What are the limitations of SRI?

• If unchecked, greater weed growth will cause substantial loss of yield.
• In Punjab, it is not promoted by the government except demonstration plots sown over a decade ago.
• It can be sustainable if organic inputs in the soil structure are maintained.

Try this PYQ:

Q.With reference to the current trends in the cultivation of sugarcane in India, consider the following statements:

1. A substantial saving in seed material is made when ‘bud chip settlings are raised in a nursery and transplanted in the main field.
2. When direct planting of setts is done, the germination percentage is better with single-budded setts as compared to setts with many buds.
3. If bad weather conditions prevail when setts are directly planted, single-budded setts have better survival as compared to large setts.
4. Sugarcane can be cultivated using settlings prepared from tissue culture.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

(a) 1 and 2 only

(b) 3 only

(c) 1 and 4 only

(d) 2,3 and 4 only

 

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A study published in the JNKVV (Jawaharlal Nehru Krishi Vishwavidyalaya) research journal concluded that heavy metal pollution of soil is “emerging at a speedy rate” in India due to industrialisation.

How does soil get contaminated?

• Soil contamination can happen due to a variety of reasons, including manufacturing, mineral extraction, accidental spills, illegal dumping, leaking underground storage tanks, pesticide and fertiliser use etc.
• These toxic heavy metals are then absorbed by food crops and other plants before they eventually make their way into our food chain, directly affecting human life along with ecology.

Detoxing the soil

• Many technologies have emerged to remediate this soil pollution.
• But these methods have been deemed lacking in terms of sustainability as they come with a large cost and have adverse effects themselves.

Novel technique: Hyperaccumulators

• Turning toward more sustainable and eco-friendly technologies, scientists have developed methods of “Phytoremediation”.
• It is a remediation method that uses living organisms like plants, microalgae, and seaweeds.
• One particular way to remove toxic heavy metals from the soil includes the use of “hyperaccumulator” plants that absorb these substances from the soil.

What are hyperaccumulator plants?

• Phytoremediation refers to the usage of “hyperaccumulator” plants to absorb the toxic materials present in the soil and accumulate in their living tissue.
• Most plants do sometimes accumulate toxic substances.
• Hyperaccumulators have the unusual ability to absorb hundreds or thousands of times greater amounts of these substances than is normal for most plants.
• Most discovered hyperaccumulator plants typically accumulate nickel and occur on soils that are rich in nickel, cobalt and in some cases, manganese.

Where are they found?

• These hyperaccumulator species have been discovered in many parts of the world.
• They include the Mediterranean region (mainly plants of the genus Alyssum), tropical outcrops in Brazi, Cuba, New Caledonia (French territory) and Southeast Asia (mainly plants of the genus Phyllanthus).

How can they be used to remove toxic metals from the soil?

• Suitable plant species can be used to ‘pick up’ the pollutants from the soil through their roots and transport them to their stem, leaves and other parts.
• After this, these plants can be harvested and either disposed or even used to extract these toxic metals from the plant.
• This process can be used to remove metals like silver, cadmium, cobalt, chromium, copper, mercury, manganese, molybdenum, nickel, lead and zinc; metalloids such as arsenic and selenium; some radionuclides; and non-metallic components such as boron.
• But it cannot be used to remove organic pollutants from the ground due to metabolic breakdown.

Advantages of phytoremediation with hyperaccumulators

• One of the primary advantages of phytoremediation is the fact that it is quite cost-effective in comparison with other remediation methods.
• The only major costs attached are related to crop management (planting, weed control, watering, fertilisation, pruning, fencing, harvesting etc.).
• This method is also relatively simple and doesn’t require any new kinds of specialised technology.
• Also, no external energy source is required since the plants grow with the help of sunlight.
• Another important advantage of this method is that it enriches the soil with organic substances and microorganisms which can protect its chemical and biological qualities.
• Also, while the plants are growing and accumulating toxic heavy metals, they protect the soil from erosion due to wind and water.

Limitations of hyperaccumulators

• For all its advantages, this kind of phytoremediation with hyperaccumulators has a big drawback: it is a very slow and time-consuming process.
• The restoration of an area with this process can take up to 10 years or more.
• This comes with a large economic cost, proportional to the size of the area under rehabilitation.
• The plants to conduct this rehabilitation must be carefully selected based on a large number of characteristics or they could act as an invasive species.
• They could grow out of control and upsetting the delicate ecological balance of not just the area under rehabilitation, but also the entire region it is part of.

What can be done for their better utilization?

• Due to this reason, scientists only propose using species that are native to the region where the phytoremediation project is undertaken.
• This also has other benefits: these plants will already be acclimatised to the region and there will be no legal problems concerning the procurement, transport and use of seeds.

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