Abstract
Forests keep our climate stable, absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen, and they regulate our water supply and improve its quality. Forests are vulnerable to anthropogenic activities which affect the biodiversity and have adverse socio-economic and environmental impacts. Large-scale destruction of the forests began with the British who wished to utilise the timber and the natural resources for the expansion and continuation of the empire. Over recent decades, human activity has also severely impacted the habitats and natural resources that wildlife and humanity depend on such as oceans, forests, coral reefs, wetlands and mangroves.
This study attempted to analyse the level of awareness among the general public about deforestation in India. The impact of deforestation is poorly understood and the rate of deforestation is alarming the environmentalists wishing to protect the wildlife and forest resources. The causes and impacts of deforestation are associated with human activities but the linkage is not clearly understood by the public and the level of awareness is poor.
Forests play a vital role in sustaining the life-support systems of a country’s environment and the quality of its people’s lives. Forests and other areas of vegetation sequester carbon from the atmosphere as they grow, and forests act as an important store of carbon even when they have reached maturity and are not increasing in size (Conti, 2008). Forests can actually prevent greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions through processes known as “wood substitution”, “biomass substitution” and “avoided land use change” (Dubey, 2009). Environmental concerns and growing awareness are creating new market avenues for certified forest products and ecosystem services. Increased concern about the threat of global climate change has brought with it greater attention to the possibility of encouraging the growth of forests as a means of removing CO2 from the atmosphere (Lubowski et al., 2006). The study summarised in this paper looked at social awareness of these roles and their linkage to human actions.
Materials and Methods
This paper summarises a study that attempted to analyse the level of awareness among the general public about deforestation in India with the help of primary and secondary information pertaining to the topic. The secondary information was collected from books, research articles and online sources. The primary information was collected from 1,074 sample respondents from various parts of the country by using a structured questionnaire. The sampling method adopted in the study is simple random sampling and the study used percentage analysis and a chi-square test for a meaningful analysis.
Background Information
Carbon is continuously cycled between forests and the atmosphere. Forests are cited in the literature both as a cause of and a means to mitigate climate change. Accepting the role of forests in carbon cycles and predicting whether they will be carbon sinks or sources in the future are important to the on-going international dialogue about climate change (Kurz and Conard, 2005). Forests act as a carbon sink by storing large quantities of carbon in vegetation and the soil; they exchange carbon with the atmosphere through photosynthesis and respiration; and act as sources of carbon if they are disturbed by anthropogenic or non-anthropogenic activities (Haripriya, 2003). Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) activities, also known as carbon sinks, can provide cost-effective ways to combat climate change, either by increasing the removal of GHGs from the atmosphere or by reducing emissions by conserving forest carbon sinks (Murthy et al., 2006).
Forests sequester (store in soil and plants) more carbon than any other terrestrial ecosystem and are an important natural brake on climate change. When forests are cleared or degraded, their stored carbon is released into the atmosphere as CO2 (Gibbs et al., 2007). Induced long-term storage of carbon on land provides a critical intervention point by which humans can modify the dynamics of the carbon cycle and, to some extent, influence the current upward trend of atmospheric CO2 concentration (Obersteiner et al., 2005). Forest products definitely play a significant role in mitigating the adverse effects of climate change by increasing the rate of carbon removal from the atmosphere (Dubey). Forestry is often cited as a sensible and low-cost carbon sequestration option to offset carbon emissions by increasing the amount of carbon stored in forests with other environmental benefits (Gorte, 2009; Ravindranath and Murthy, 2003). Forestry is recognised as a measure to mitigate atmospheric GHGs especially CO2 by the Kyoto Protocol under its Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). The international community is increasingly realising that the mitigation of global warming will not be achieved without the inclusion of forests in the mitigation plan (Chaturvedi et al., 2011). Sequestered carbon in eligible new forests can be used to create carbon credits for sale to organisations or individuals who are looking to offset some of their carbon emissions.
Absorbing CO2 from the atmosphere and moving it into the physical ecosystem as plant biomass and finally into the soil is the only practical way of removing large excesses of CO2 (the major GHG) from the atmosphere into the biological system (Ramachandran et al., 2007). Forests are significant carbon sinks and they have the potential to stabilise atmospheric carbon in the near term, i.e., 20–50 years, which provides time to develop innovative and radical technological solutions to the problem of finding reduced carbon emission energy sources (Sedjo, 2001). Activities that alter forests significantly affect the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere (Gorte and Ramseur, 2008).
Reducing the volume of GHG emissions caused by deforestation and forest degradation has become widely recognised as a possible component in national policies for mitigating climate change.
In India, the total area under forest cover is 708,273 km2 which is 21.54 percent of the geographical area of India (FSI, 2017). Forest degradation and the increasing percentage of existing forest areas that have come to be categorised as “open forests” (low density forest areas with a canopy density of 10–40 percent) are a threat to the environmental services of forests and carbon sequestration. They could bring about a qualitative loss of the forest wealth and cover. India’s forest policies should aim at increasing forest cover to 33 percent of the geographical area of the country without compromising the existing dense forest areas.
Forests are also commercially important natural resources, which contribute to the State exchequer through foreign trade as well as providing livelihoods for dependent communities and delivering environmental and climatic services for the wellbeing of society. A measure of national wealth developed by the World Bank includes the value of natural capital, such as minerals, timber and non-timber forest assets, cropland, pastureland and protected areas (FAO, 2012). Widespread deforestation would cause the land to become warmer and drier, and would have social, economic and environmental impacts as well as causing serious health issues. Deforestation would also lead to the drying of natural springs and the reduction of stream flows, resulting in serious impacts on access to clean drinking water. It will change the habitats of plants and animals, reduce or destroy crops and kill livestock (Mawalagedara and Oglesby, 2012).
Generally, the valuation of forests only takes into account the tangible goods and products provided by the forests. Environmental and climatic services delivered by forests are completely or partially omitted, even though they have a much greater influence on social function and the economy. National and corporate accounts do not include figures for the natural resources that are essential to these goods and products. The study summarised in this paper analysed the awareness among the general public about deforestation in India.
Study Results and Discussion
The following paragraphs summarise the results of the study.
It is believed that age plays an important role in awareness about society and that as people grow older, their level of understanding about how society works will improve. In this study, 33.1 percent of the 1,074 persons who responded were less than 20 years of age; 47.2 percent were between 21–40 years old; 18.1 percent were 41–60 years old; and the remaining 1.7 percent of the sample respondents were 61–80 years old. The chi-square test results revealed a strong association (.630) between the age of respondents and the level of awareness about deforestation.
A number of studies in India have included gender discrimination, particularly in access to education, healthcare, nutritional intake and social treatment as a common and relevant factor. Hence, this study also examined differences in level of awareness about deforestation by gender. Of respondents, 57.3 percent were male and 42.7 percent were female. Regarding deforestation, 56.1 percent of the female respondents and 52.9 percent of the male sample respondents were aware of the impact of deforestation.
It is believed that education is the remedy for all social problems and this study attempted to analyse the relationship between the level of education and level of awareness about deforestation. The chi-square test results revealed that there is a strong positive relationship (.640) between levels of education and level of awareness about deforestation.
The Government of India announced its National Action Plan on Climate Change on 3 June 2008. That plan reflects the recognition that economic growth will hit a dead end if it does not embrace sustainability as a goal. The core of the national action plan is comprised of eight national missions, representing multipronged, long-term and integrated strategies for achieving key goals in the context of climate change. Going green has become a popular slogan in the discourse of environmental conservation, and one that has been gaining wider popularity as global warming begins to threaten the very existence of the biotic world. The Government of India introduced the Green India Mission as part of its National Action Plan for Climate Change with a budget of Rs 46,000 crores (Rs 460 billion) over a period of 10 years. The supreme goal of this mission is to increase forest and tree cover over five million hectares and recover the quality of forest cover in another five million hectares (MOEF, 2011).
Sustainable development involves valuing the environment and properly internalising the values and costs of environmental services that currently are provided for free, owing to their absence from the functioning of the market system. This situation inevitably leads to the overexploitation of environmental resources and services (MOEF). The management and monitoring of the terrestrial carbon cycle is essential in order to tackle climate change, because about a third of CO2 emissions into the atmosphere since the industrial revolution were derived from land-use changes (clearing and cultivation; urban development, etc.), and the environment’s current absorption capacity is only about a third of anthropogenic CO2 emissions into the atmosphere in terrestrial ecosystems (Watson and Noble, 2005). Growing trees for carbon sequestration and thereby mitigating the harmful effects of climate change and global warming is a novel and viable option for developing countries with enormous forest resources.
Conclusion
India could benefit immensely from the application of market-based mechanisms to the internalisation of the costs of ecosystem services including carbon sequestration and other economic values of forests. Currently undervalued, forests have the benefit of some public awareness about forest ecosystem services, and this will help India to deal better with the problem of deforestation. It would not be difficult to implement the necessary measures to protect the forests from deforestation and thereby enjoy the benefits of the life-support ecosystem services offered by them and to realise the economic benefits of carbon sequestration.