Prospects and problems of afforestation of wastelands in India: A synthesis of macro- and micro-perspectives

There are large tracts of wastelands in India, which have been lying almost barren for decades. Wasteland afforestation is found to be a financially viable and environmentally sound use of most of those lands. In addition, tree planting on wastelands is emerging as a potent tool for arresting the increasing misuse and over-exploitation of these lands and environmental degradation in India. This paper presents an overview of afforestation programmes in India undertaken by various agencies, then examines the prospects of increasing the pace of afforestation and identifies various policy and institutional issues that impede the pace of wastelands afforestation. This is done by adopting a two-pronged methodology comprising a review of literature available on the subject (a macro-perspective) and case studies (a micro-perspective). The results of this study show that there is inadequate investment in the forestry sector as a whole and there are several policy and institutional obstacles to promoting wastelands afforestation in India.