500 new licences for wood-based industries in India

​The Forest Department has decided to issue online about 500 new licences for establishing wood-based industries, said Forest Minister Rao Narbir Singh said here today. The licences of functional wood-based industries would also be renewed online, the minister added.

The minister said that the department had already launched two e-Citizen services, namely “Permission for Felling of Trees” and “NoCs in respect of PLPA or Forest or Restricted land”.  These two services had been integrated with the Right to Service Act.

He said that Forest Department had so far carried out digitisation of block forest areas in 14 districts through HARSAC . The digitisation work in the districts of Mahendragarh, Ambala, Kurukshetra, Mewat, Gurgaon, Faridabad and Rewari was under progress. He said that the department had planted 141.01 lakh saplings over 18,842 hectares. Besides, 31.56 lakh plants had also been sold or distributed under the ‘Har Ghar Hariyali’ programme.