The Meteorological Department has predicted a hot and dry summer this year. The Uttarakhand government has decided – coinciding with the start of the forest fire season in the state – that industry players involved in making pine needle products will be given a 70% discount.
In addition, the Forest Department will create a “Special Fund” to pay all NGOs involved in the collection of pine needles from forests. Also, the transit fee for transportation of pine needles will be reduced.
70% relaxation in GST for pine needle product makers
The meeting was chaired by Chief Secretary SS Sandhu and attended by senior forest officials. The extraction of pine needles from the forest floor is important, as a study by the Indian Institute of Remote Sensing (IIRS) during the lockdown established that 70% of forest fires are related to anthropogenic activities.
Chir needles (leaves of pine trees) are highly inflammable and often, a bidi or match stick carelessly thrown in a chir pine forest is said to be the cause of a major forest fire in the hills. According to the forest department, chir deodar forests cover about 3.94 lakh hectares of the state’s total forest area and the trees shed at least 15 lakh metric tonnes of pine needles annually, creating a highly flammable situation in the forests, especially during summer.
Incidentally, of the 13 different types of trees classified by the Forest Department here, chir pine has the largest area – about 15.25% of the total 25,86,318 hectares.
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