Hyderabad: The principal chief conservators of forests (PCCF) of seven states on Saturday unanimously felt the need for working together to protect wildlife and forests.
The chief foresters of Maharashtra, AP, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Arunachal Pradesh and Karnataka participated in a two-day workshop organised by the TS forest department to discuss measures to protect forests and wildlife and to remove encroachments.
Chief Secretary S.K. Joshi, inaugurating the workshop, said protecting the forests from encroachments had become a great challenge to the governments.
“Instead of depending on forests for wood in constructions and manufacturing furniture, we have to explore alternative ways to ease the burden on forests,” he said.
Mr Joshi said that to protect wildlife, it was essential to prevent encroachment by humans. While explaining the measures taken by the TS government to protect forests and encourage afforestation, he said the cooperation of neighbouring states was key in protecting wildlife.
Mr U.K. Agarwal, PCCF of Maharashtra, said the removal of encroachments from the forests had become a difficult task. He added that there were 35,000 illegal encroachers in Sanjay Gandhi National Park which was situated about 1 km from Borivali railway station, one of the distant suburbs of Mumbai.
He said that they were using radio collar technology to track the movement of tigers in the Park.
Mr R.K. Upadhyay from Tamil Nadu said foot patrols of forest officers would yield better results instead of depending on technology. He suggested the deployment of more trained officers for the protection of forests.
Mr P Sridhar, PCCF of Karnataka, said protection of wildlife had become a difficult task with the increase in the population of elephants and tigers in their forests.
Mr Mohd lliyas Rizvi, PCCF of AP, said they had given priority to developing the Mada forests near Kakinada. Mr P.K. Jha from Telangana state), Mr K. Kesavan (Kerala) and Mr Ravindra Kumar (Arunachal Pradesh) participated in the workshop.
Mr. Joshi released a coffee table book on Haritha Haram and a census resport on the availability of water resources in the state’s forests.
