Question : Degraded Lands

(a) whether the 35 per cent of country’s land is degraded/eroded due to deforestation,unsustainable agricultural practices and excessive ground water extraction etc.;
(b) if so, the details of the extent of degraded lands and the corrective measures taken by the Government in this regard, State/UT-wise;
(c) whether his Ministry has any plan/ scheme for the treatment/reclamation of degraded lands;
(d) if so, the details thereof including funds sanctioned and the work done during the last three years and the current year, State/UT-wise;
(e) whether the country has committed to land degradation neutrality by 2030 as part of Sustainable Development Goal and if so, the details thereof; and
(f) the steps taken/being taken by the Union Government in this regard?

MINISTER OF STATE FOR RURAL DEVELOPMENT
(SHRI RAM KRIPAL YADAV)

(a) to (f): As per information received from Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), around 120.4 million ha area of the county is affected by various kinds of land degradation comprising of water erosion (82.6 million ha), wind erosion (12.0 million ha), chemical degradation (24.8 million ha) and physical degradation (1.0 million ha).

ICAR has developed several location specific bio-engineering measures to check soil erosion due to run-off of rain water, sand dune stabilization and shelter belt technology to check wind erosion and reclamation technology for problem soils in the country.

Department of Land Resources has sanctioned 8214 watershed development projects in 28 States (except Goa) [during the period 2009-10 to 2014-15] covering an area of about 39.07 million hectare under the Watershed Development Component (WDC) of the Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY) principally for development of rainfed portions of net cultivated area and culturable wastelands.

The activities being undertaken through the watershed development projects inter alia include ridge area treatment, drainage line treatment, soil and moisture conservation, rain water harvesting, nursery raising, afforestation, horticulture, pasture development, livelihoods for assetless persons, etc.

State-wise details of number of sanctioned projects, area covered by the projects and Central share released during the last three years and the current year (upto 28th February 2018) under IWMP/WDC-PMKSY are given in Annexure I.

In addition, other Central Ministries / Departments like Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare are implementing schemes and programmes like the Per Drop More Crop component of PMKSY which inter alia includes activities for water conservation, drought proofing, water harvesting, ground water recharge, etc. that complement and supplement interventions undertaken under the WDC-PMKSY.

National Afforestation & Eco-Development Board, Ministry of Environment, Forests & Climate Change is implementing National Afforestation Programme (NAP) for regeneration of degraded forest and adjoining areas through people''s participation. The scheme is being implemented through a decentralized mechanism of State Forest Development Agency (SFDA) at State level, Forest Development agency (FDA) at Forest Division level and Joint Forest Management Committees (JFMCs) at Village level. An amount of Rs 477.30 crores have been released to the States to treat an area of 152627 hectares during the last three years including the current year (2014-15 to 2017-18) as on 28-02-2018 details are given in Annexure II.

Further, Government of India has announced the commitment to work towards achieving Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) by 2030 with the cooperation and synchronized efforts of all the relevant Ministries.
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