Protected Areas such as Kanha, Pench, Satpuda, Melghat and Tadoba-Andhari are the watersheds that feed these rivers and must be rewarded for the tangible and intangible benefits they offer. For instance, Nagpur city draws 456 million litres of water per day from Pench. In a welcome move, the Maharashtra state government has announced a new state forest policy according to which civic corporations, industrial units and power houses will have to pay two per cent ‘green cess' on the total charges of water consumption. Following a campaign by the Satpuda Foundation to create a system where the cess collected from users goes directly for the protection of the watersheds, the government has incorporated the same in the state's forest policy.
However, Kishor Rithe of the Satpuda Foundation warns that the forest policy is still to be implemented and is not comprehensive as it fails to cover issues such as overgrazing, forest fires and afforestation to take the state's forest cover to 33 per cent.
October 2008
