Forest Department earns Rs 386 cr revenue from timber, other auctions
| Date :04-Aug-2019 |
By Ramesh Marulkar:
Forest Department earned a revenue of whopping Rs 386 crore from timber and bamboo e-Auction and ground auction during the financial year ending on March 31, 2019. The department earned a revenue of Rs 290 crore from timber auction, Rs 2.38 crore from bamboo auction and Rs 94 crore from ground auction during the period. The revenue is more than double than the revenue of Rs 159 crore earned by the department during the fiscal year 2017-18. It was just Rs 100 crore during the previous year -- 2016-17. Moreover, the department earned revenue of around Rs 145 crore from auction of timber, bamboo and firewood ground and e-auctions in last four months.
This was possible because of better management of sale depots and intervention made by Umesh Kumar Agrawal, Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (Head of Forest Force), who took charge of the post on April 1, 2018. The department conducts harvesting of forest in which tree felling is done as per the prescriptions of Working Plan. After felling timber, the material is brought to sale depots for auction but the timber running into thousands of cubic metres was lying in jungle due to want of transport and other reasons. Agrawal took the initiative in taking out all such materials from jungle and bringing to sale depots. He had instructed Depot Managers to ensure materials are disposed off within six months.
This was one of the reasons leading to increase in the revenue. Moreover, many times logs remained unsold for long period, deteriorating the grains and quality of teakwood. Agrawal issued instructions and delegated power to Depot Managers to sell the timber even below upset prices. When desired prices were not obtained upto four auctions then the materials were sold irrespective of upset prices. This avoided lying of valuable materials for long time. During the past four months, the department earned Rs 116.56 crore from timber e-auction, Rs 25 crore from ground action and Rs 2.55 crore from firewood auction. It also earned a revenue of Rs 79.63 lakh from bamboo auction during the period.