In its continuing efforts to strengthen engagement with the Governments in India, Dr Suresh Gairola, FSC India Country Director held interactive meetings with the senior forest officers of West Bengal Forest Department and West Bengal Forest Development Corporation. In the meeting held on 13 September 2022 at Aranya Bhawan, Forest Department Headquarters in the capital city of Kolkata, he talked about the salient features of FSC Forest Stewardship Standard (FSS) for India and FSC FSS for Smallholders in India, the two India-specific standards which have been published in June and August this year.
The participants showed keen interest in various aspects of forest management certification, chain of custody certification, ecosystem services procedure and the process for obtaining certification. The queries in the Q&A session included cost of certification, advantages of certification over management plans, and developing synergy between FSC ES procedure and ES evaluation norms of Government of India. It was suggested to include animal based NTFPs like honey, tussar and silk in India standard.
In his concluding remarks, Mr Soumitra Dasgupta, Principal Chief Conservator of Forests and Head of Forest Department mentioned that the session was very informative and useful for improving responsible forest management in the state. On this occasion, copies of the two India-specific standards were presented to him.
The forest cover in West Bengal is 1.68 million hectares which is about 19% of the geographical area. With 87 million cu m of growing stock, the main tree species are Shorea robusta, Acacia auriculiformis, Lagerstroemia spaciosa, Tectona grandis and Schima wallichaii.