Desertification and Land Degradation Atlas "EMPOWER IAS"

In news:

• The Union Environment Ministry has released the latest version of “Desertification and Land Degradation Atlas of India.

 

Desertification and Land Degradation Atlas

• It has been published by Space Application Centre, ISRO, Ahmedabad.
• The Atlas provides a state-wise area of degraded lands for the time frame 2018-19.
• It also provides the change analysis for the duration of 15 years, from 2003-05 to 2018-19.
• It would provide important baseline and temporal data and technical inputs.

 

Degraded land in India

• About 29.32% of the Total Geographical Area of the country is undergoing the process of desertification/land degradation.
• Approximately 6.35% of land in Uttar Pradesh is undergoing desertification/degradation.

 

Content of the atlas

• This Atlas presents state-wise desertification and land degradation status maps depicting land use, the process of degradation, and severity level.
• This was prepared using IRS Advanced Wide Field Sensor (AWiFS) data of 2011-13- and 2003-05-time frames in the GIS environment.
• The area under desertification/land degradation for both time frames and changes are reported state-wise as well as for the entire country.
• The outputs are helpful in prioritizing areas to be taken up for minimizing the impact of desertification and land degradation.

 

Various move for land conservation

• National Afforestation & Eco Development Board (NAEB) Division of the MoEFCC is implementing the “National Afforestation Programme (NAP)” for ecological restoration of degraded forest areas.
• Various other schemes like Green India Mission, fund accumulated under Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA), Nagar Van Yojana etc. also help in checking degradation and restoration of forest landscape.
• MoEF&CC also promote tree outside forests realizing that the country has a huge potential for increasing its Trees Outside Forest (TOF) area primarily through expansion of agroforestry, optimum use of wastelands and vacant lands.

 

India and desertification

• Desertification and land degradation are major threats to agricultural productivity in our country.
• India hosted the 14^th session of the Conference of Parties (COP 14) of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) in September 2019.
• India is striving towards achieving the national commitments of Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) and restoration of 26 million ha of degraded land by 2030.
• India has been at the forefront of bringing the issue of land degradation to the core of relevant international alliances for the protection and conservation of the environment.
• India has adopted a collective approach for making progress towards achieving the national commitments related to land restoration.

 

 

Various institutions for land conservation

• Indian Institute of Soil and Water Conservation (IISWC): Bio-engineering measures to check soil erosion due to run-off of rain water
• Central Arid Zone Research Institute (CAZRI), Jodhpur: Sand dune stabilization and shelter belt technology to check wind erosion
• Council through Central Soil Salinity Research Institute, Karnal: Reclamation technology, sub-surface drainage, bio-drainage, agroforestry interventions and salt tolerant crop varieties to improve the productivity of saline, sodic and waterlogged soils in the country