July 11 – GS1/Geography: 2026 | UPSC Daily Answer Writing Practice PDF Download

Q: Examine the status of forest resources of India and its resultant impact on climate Change. (UPSC GS1 Mains )

Answer: 

Forests play an important role in the socio-economic development of a country like India. They are rich sources of energy, housing, firewood, timber and fodder and they provide employment to a large section of the rural population. The recorded forest area in India is about 76.5 million ha (23% of total land mass). 

• The status of forest resources of India According to the 16th India State of Forest Report (ISFR) the total forest and tree cover of the country is 80.73 million hectare which is 24.56 percent of the geographical area of the country. Area-wise Madhya Pradesh has the largest forest cover in the country followed by Arunachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Odisha and Maharashtra. 
• In terms of forest cover as percentage of total geographical area, the top five States are Mizoram (85.41%), Arunachal Pradesh (79.63%), Meghalaya (76.33%), Manipur (75.46%) and Nagaland (75.31%).The total mangrove cover in the country is 4,975 sq. km. An increase of 54 sq. Km in mangrove cover has been observed. 
• Top three states showing mangrove cover increase are Gujarat (37 sq. km) followed by Maharashtra (16 sq. km) and Odisha (8 sq. km). The report presents a gloomy picture of the forests in North Eastern States. The forest cover of six states, excluding Assam, has decreased by nearly 18 per cent between 2011 and 2019. 
• But there are regions which are under the brunt of deforestation due to development initiatives like the expansion of the Talabira coal mine in Odisha, requires the cutting of over 130,000 trees. 

Impact on Climate Change 

• Trees remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through photosynthesis. Cutting down forests will cause a decline in photosynthetic activity which results in the atmosphere retaining higher levels of carbon dioxide. Forests also store an enormous amount of organic carbon which is released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide when forests are cleared by burning. Clearly, deforestation contributes to global warming and ocean acidification. 
• Water recycling is the movement of rain from the forest to land masses further inland. When rain falls on forests the water is intercepted by the forest canopy. Some of this intercepted water is returned to the atmosphere by evaporation and transpiration (release of water vapor into the atmosphere through stomata on tree leaves) while the rest is returned to the ocean as river runoff. 
• In a healthy forest about three fourth of the intercepted water is returned to the atmosphere as moisture laden air masses which move inland, cool and are converted to rain. Land cleared by deforestation returns only about one fourth of the rain water to the atmosphere. This air mass has less moisture and delivers less rain further inland. Deforestation inhibits water recycling and converts inland forest to dry land and potential waste land. 
• Severe flooding is a result of deforestation because removal of the forest leaves little vegetative cover to hold heavy rains. The inability of land void of forest to hold heavy rain water will also trigger mudslides. Severe flooding and mudslides are extremely costly because they devastate homes and communities. 
• However, new research from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur, shows that a majority of Indian forests are exceptionally resilient to large variations in rainfall and short droughts caused by climate change. The research, which used canopy cover and rainfall changes as criteria to deduce resilience, revealed that forests in wetter regions and scrubs in drier regions would be more resilient to rainfall decline.

Conclusion 
No amount of innovation or technology can replace the life-giving functions that forests provide for people and the planet. It is now established that effectively protecting and restoring forests has the potential to deal with 30% of global greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, thereby significantly mitigating the effects of climate change. Hence, forests and so their conservation is of essential importance.