Forest dependency as a means of livelihood has dropped perceptibly in villages particularly near wet zone forests during the past few decades.

Experts at a roundtable here on Monday said the government should promote alternative fuels in rural areas and formulate new laws for effective forest management so that the communities continue to benefit from the resources and contribute towards its regeneration.

They also demanded revision of forest laws, addressing landownership and judicious distribution of royalty among forest communities

Community forestry has been rewarded with US$ 95,000 (approximately Rs 6.8 million) for reducing emissions in the atmosphere causing climate change through enhancement of carbon stocks and sustainable management of forests.

Representatives of three community forest users

The Republic of Congo will plant 1 million hectares of trees by 2020 to restore degraded forest and provide wood for paper and fuel, the president said on Friday.

President Denis Sassou N'Guesso made the announcement on the final day of a weeklong summit in the Congolese capital, aimed at tackling deforestation in the Amazon, Congo and Borneo-Mekong forest basins, the three largest in the world

Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh today took exception to diesel subsidy being "enjoyed" by mobile companies and owners of luxury vehicles and suggested that the measure be instead extended to people in the forest areas in the form of cooking gas rebate to help save the trees.

"Diesel subsidy was meant to benefit the users in the agriculture sector.

Investing an additional $40 billion annually in the forestry sector can halve deforestation rates by 2030, increase rates of tree planting by about 140 per cent by the year 2050, and catalyse the creation of millions of new jobs, according to a report by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).
Backed by the right kind of enabling policies, such an investment