Revitalization of Rivers in India Draft Policy - Isha Guru Jaggi Vasudev

Revitalization of Rivers In India
Draft Policy Recommendation
On June 15, 2016, the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change, Government of
India placed the draft National Forest Policy in the public domain for comments and suggestions.
It is slated to replace the National Forest Policy, 1988. The draft National Forest Policy (NFP)
proposes the levy of a ‘green tax’ for facilitating ecologically responsible behaviour and
supplementing financial resources essential to address forestry woes. “The budget of the forestry
sector should be appropriately enhanced so that the objectives enshrined in this policy can be
achieved. Environmental cess, green tax, carbon tax may be levied on certain products and
services for facilitating ecologically responsible behaviour, garnering citizen’s contribution and
supplementing financial resources,” the draft policy says. Furthermore, the policy mentions
that climate change concerns should be effectively factored into all the forest and wildlife areas
management plans and community ecosystem management plans. The policy says, “Largescale
expansion of agro-forestry and farm forestry should be encouraged through commensurate
incentives and operational support systems such as lowering the input costs and enabling access
to reasonably priced quality planting material.”
3.2 National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture (NMSA) 19
Sustainable agriculture can be defined as the form of agriculture aimed at meeting
the food and fuel needs of the present generation without endangering the
resource base for the future generations. Sustaining agricultural productivity
depends on quality and availability of natural resources like soil and water.
Agricultural growth can be sustained by promoting conservation and sustainable
use of these scarce natural resources through appropriate location specific
measures. Indian agriculture remains predominantly rain-fed covering about 60%
of the country’s net sown area and accounts for 40% of the total food production.
Thus, conservation of natural resources in conjunction with development of
rain-fed agriculture holds the key to meet burgeoning demands for food grain
in the country. Towards this end, National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture
(NMSA) has been formulated for enhancing agricultural productivity especially
in rain-fed areas focusing on integrated farming, water use efficiency, soil health
management and synergizing resource conservation.
NMSA derives its mandate from Sustainable Agriculture Mission which is one
of the eight Missions outlined under National Action Plan on Climate Change
Annexures
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