FOREST COVER

Forest cover is the amount of forest that covers a particular area of land. Forest
cover is defined as an area more than 1 ha in extent and having tree canopy
density of 10 percent and above, regardless of land use or ownership. This
differs from the United Nations' definition of forests, which excludes areas
predominantly under agricultural and urban land use. It may be measured as
relative (in percent) or absolute (in square kilometres/square miles). Nearly a
third of the world's land surface is covered with forest, with closed-canopy forest
accounting for 4 - 5 billion hectares of land. Forests provide many ecosystem
services that humans and animals cannot survive without, but anthropogenic
actions and climate change are threatening global forest cover in potentially
irreversible ways.

The forest cover is broadly classified in 4 classes:

Very dense All Lands with tree cover (Including mangrove cover) of canopy
Forest density of 70% and above

Moderately All lands with tree cover (Including mangrove cover) of canopy
Dense Forest density between 40% and 70% above

All lands with tree cover (Including mangrove cover) of canopy

Open forest
density between 10% and 40%

All forest lands with poor tree growth mainly of small or

Scurb
stunted trees having canopy density less than 10 percent

Non Forest Any area not included in the above classes

Since 19.53% in the early 1980s, India’s forest cover has increased to 21.71%
in 2021. Adding to this a notional 2.91% tree cover estimated in 2021, the
country’s total green cover now stands at 24.62%, on paper.

The National Remote Sensing Agency (NRSA) under the Department of Space
used satellite imagery to estimate India's forest cover for the periods of 1971-
1975 and 1980-1982. Their analysis showed a loss of 2.79% in just seven years,
from 16.89% to 14.10%.

While there is no reliable data on encroachment, government records indicate

that 42,380 sq km (size of Haryana) of forest land was diverted for non-forest
use between 1951 and 1980.

Since 2003, almost 20,000 sq km of dense forests have become non-forests,

which is largely compensated by nearly 11,000 sq km of non-forest areas that
became dense forests in successive two-year windows since 2003.