The long-awaited tree census of Nagpur city is facing a road-block as the Mumbai-based implementing company is demanding the renewal of contract with Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC). Terracon Ecotech Pvt Ltd of Mumbai has been appointed by the civic body to conduct the tree count of city and as per the contract, the company would prepare a database of 25 lakh trees for NMC. However, as per the latest data provided by the civic body, the tree count has already crossed 26,14,363 trees in all the 10 zones of Nagpur.

 

“A review meeting was held recently under the chairmanship of Municipal Commissioner and Administrator Dr Abhijit Chaudhari in which he directed the officials to renew the contract and allocate fund to the company for smooth conduct of the census,” Ganesh Rathod, Deputy Municipal Commissioner, Garden Department told ‘The Hitavada’. The tree census was supposed to be completed within 11 months of its commencement, but the project is still half done even after the deadline has passed. The first census was carried out by NMC in 2011 when the city had 21,43,838 trees. Now, this is the second tree census which is taking place after a gap of 12 years. Even after delay of 22 months, Deputy Municipal Commissioner is predicting that it will require seven more months to complete the process. Even after so much delay, the company has managed to complete the tree count of only five zones. This time, census will be carried out with the help of GIS and GPS technologies.

 

The city is spread over 222 sq km and many new areas like Hudkeshwar and Narsala were later included. So, knowing the current number of trees in the city was required and with this objective, the census started in 2022. As per the data, the counting of trees in five zones -- Gandhibag, Nehru Nagar, Lakadganj, Ashi Nagar and Hanuman Nagar -- has been completed. Whereas, the counting is underway in Satranjipura zone and 35-40% trees are already recorded by the agency.

 

The major tree cover of Nagpur city is in Laxmi Nagar, Dhantoli, Dharampeth and Mangalwari zones, where the tree counting is yet to be completed. In Dhantoli and Dharampeth zones, 20-25% work has been completed so far. Only 5-10% trees have been counted in Laxmi Nagar zone and only 1-2% work has beencompleted in Mangalwari zone till date. Nehru Nagar zone has 7,40,956 trees which is the highest number among all the five completed zones. Similarly, Gandhibag zone has the lowest tree cover as the agency counted there only 59,528 trees even after many plantation drives encouraged by the State Government in last 5-6 years. All the completed five zones have a total of 19,45,927 trees.