India has revised the Green India Mission (GIM) with a bold target to restore 25 million hectares of degraded land by 2030, aligning forest restoration with climate action.

India’s Restoration Commitment and Current Status

• Carbon Sink Target (NDC): Under the Paris Climate Change Agreement (Nationally Determined Contribution—NDC), India promised to produce a 3.39 billion ton carbon sink by 2030. 
  • A carbon sink acts like a sponge, absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
• Forest Cover Growth: India’s forest cover has increased, rising from 24.16% in 2015 to 25.17% in 2023.
• Plantation Coverage Achieved:  Between 2015 and 2021, GIM supported afforestation and related activities across 11.22 million hectares, indicating tangible progress on the ground.
• Increase in Forest Cover:  India’s forest and tree cover increased from 24.16% in 2015 to 25.17% in 2023, reflecting measurable gains in overall green cover.
• Quality Decline (The Alarming Finding): A 2025 joint study by IIT Kanpur, IIT Bombay, and BITS Pilani revealed a 12% decline in the photosynthetic efficiency of India’s dense forests, indicating reduced CO₂ absorption capacity and weakening forest health.
• Causes of Decline: The decline is linked to rising temperatures and soil drying, highlighting that quantity alone isn’t enough—India must focus on planting resilient, climate-adaptive trees to restore forest vitality.

Revised Green India Mission (GIM) and Integration

• Restoration Goal: The GIM blueprint has been revised with a major goal of restoring 25 million hectares of degraded land by 2030
• Shift from Canopy Creation to Ecological Quality: The Mission now prioritizes native and climate-resilient species, recognising that carbon sequestration depends on forest health, not merely on tree count.
• Priority to Ecologically Sensitive Zones:  The revised blueprint prioritizes restoration in Aravalli Hills, Western Ghats, mangroves, and Himalayan catchments, recognising these regions as critical ecological landscapes.
• Convergence with Other Government Programmes: GIM seeks to align with existing schemes like the National Agroforestry Policy, watershed programmes, and CAMPA (Compensatory Afforestation Fund), ensuring better coordination and reduced duplication.

Challenges in the Implementation of Commitments

• Legal Rights Often Ignored: Although the Forest Rights Act (2006) mandates community involvement in forest management, plantation drives often proceed without community consent, reducing ownership and legitimacy.
• Ecologically Unsuitable Plantations: Past afforestation drives often used monoculture species like eucalyptus and acacia, which deplete groundwater, reduce biodiversity, and increase climate vulnerability.
• Capacity Gaps in Forest Departments: Effective restoration requires expertise in species selection, soil ecology, and hydrology, but field staff lack adequate training. Institutes in Uttarakhand, Coimbatore, and Byrnihat, though capable, remain underutilized for ecological restoration training.
• Financing Bottlenecks:  The CAMPA fund holds around ₹95,000 crore, yet states like Delhi have used only 23% of their allocation between 2019 and 2024, showing poor fund utilization.

Initiatives By Various States

• Community participation:  States like Odisha and Chhattisgarh involve Joint Forest Management Committees, proving that community participation improves survival rates and ensures local support.
• Biochar: Himachal Pradesh has launched a biochar programme to generate carbon credits while reducing fire risks.
  • Biochar is a carbon-rich, porous material produced by heating organic biomass (such as crop residues, wood waste, or manure) in a low-oxygen environment, a process known as pyrolysis. It is used primarily as a soil amendment to improve soil health and sequester carbon.
• Plantation: Uttar Pradesh has planted over 39 crore saplings this year and is exploring how to connect village councils to carbon markets. 

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Way Forward

• Community-led Restoration: Restoration projects should be planned and managed in partnership with Gram Sabhas and forest-dependent communities to ensure ownership and long-term protection.
• Build Institutional Capacity: Training and incentives for forest staff should be based on survival rate, species diversity, and ecological outcomes, not on the number of trees planted.
• Effective Utilisation of CAMPA Funds: CAMPA funds should support planning, monitoring, and adaptive management, enabling restoration beyond plantation activities.
• Transparency and Accountability: Public dashboards should display survival rates, species composition, fund utilisation, and community participation, ensuring accountability.

Conclusion

India’s revised Green India Mission shifts focus from tree count to ecological resilience, stressing community participation, skilled implementation, and fund efficiency to achieve meaningful, climate-adaptive forest restoration by 2030.

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