Telangana: Zero in on smuggling, foresters told

Special Chief Secretary for Forests directs the officials to focus on forest regeneration in all districts

Hyderabad: Special Chief Secretary for Forests, Shanthi Kumari, said everyone in the department should work with the objective of ensuring zero smuggling cases across the State.

Officials should take necessary steps to identify the forest lands block-wise boundaries in all districts, apart from intensifying forest regeneration measures, she said during a meeting with department officials here on Sunday.

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To this effect, district-level committee meetings will be conducted, and the focus should be on forest regeneration in forest blocks in all the districts, she said at the meeting which was an extension to the Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao’s meeting with District Collectors.

Forest protection committee meetings should be convened and action plans should be finalized accordingly. As part of Haritha Haram seventh edition, emphasis should be on multi-level avenue plantation along the roadsides, and plantation of big saplings should be taken up on priority, she said adding that the Forest Department should extend technical support to Haritha Haram programmes taken up by other departments.

“The state government has planned to develop 109 urban forest parks and among these 50 per cent have been completed. The rest of the parks should be completed at the earliest” said Shanthi Kumari.

Principal Chief Conservator of Forests R. Shobha directed officials to work in ensuring zero smuggling cases in the State. Towards this, the existing check-posts should be strengthened and officials should conduct extensive field visits and regularly monitor the surveillance camera footage, she said.

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