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Chapter III. 



THE PAST AND PRESENT POLICY OF GOVERNMENT 

 REGARDING AFFORESTATION. 



Up to the present, the conditions leading up to the necessity Dr - Brandis's 

 for afforestation have been described and it is now proposed to 

 deal with the actual progress made in this direction. 



The question of utilizing the waste lands in the Agra, Etawah and 

 adjoining districts and establishment of fuel and fodder reserves 

 was the subject of a report in 1879 by Dr. D. Brandis, then 

 Inspector-General of Forest to the Government of India. In 

 the report attention was drawn to the large tracts of ravine 

 country lying on both sides of the Jumna river and the extent 

 of wastes to be found in several districts of the Doab. The 

 measures recommended in this report for the encouragement of 

 forest growth on these lands were (1) the exclusion of fire ; (2) 

 restriction of grazing ; (3) the prohibition of all wood-cutting ; ^4) 

 filling up of blank areas by planting and sowing. The report 

 recommended the acquisition of suitably situated and sufficiently 

 large blocks of waste land which should not be too far from the 

 markets of the produce. 



On this report instructions were issued to District Officers to 

 ascertain and report, after consultation with the Conservators of 

 Forests, whether suitable blocks of waste land could be obtained 

 for the purposes indicated. The tracts of country recommended 

 for afforestation were in due course inspected by a Forest officer 

 who was unable to recommend the scheme on financial grounds. 

 The practice, even now iu force, of meeting capital expenditure on 

 forest development from current revenue was no doubt largely 

 responsible for the failure to expand and progress was- also ham- 

 [ ered by an insufficient staff. 



The urgent necessity of increasing the area of fodder and fuel 

 reserves in order to mitigate the severity of famines was again 

 brought to the notice of the Government of India, who, in 

 March, 1883, issued a resolution instituting further enquiry as to 

 how far such provision was essential. The result of these 

 enquiries, however, did not uphold the assumption that the area 

 of grazing grounds and wooded tracts had recently decreased to any 

 large extent or that there was a growing scarcity of fodder or fuel 

 and it was again recorded that the further extension of existing 

 areas would be a matter of great expense and the results uncertain. 

 It was decided to postpone operations on a large scale until the 



