The roadblock for ongoing tree census of Nagpur city is continuing as the selection of new implementing agency is still in limbo. Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) appointed a Mumbai-based company to implement the tree census of the city and as per the contract, the company would count trees and if the number crosses 25 lakh, the contract would then be renewed. The company implemented the work and within one year, it completed the tree count of 26 lakh in city and sought renewal of the contract. However, NMC did not renew the contract of the company that stalled the tree census. As per the latest development, NMC is now planning to seek help of a Government agency to complete the tree census.

 

For this, the civic body is putting in efforts to decide on the agency. “We are planning to appoint a Government agency to conduct the tree census and for this, a meeting will be held soon. After selection of the agency, the process will take six more months till December to complete the process,” Amol Chorepagar, Garden Superintendent, NMC told ‘The Hitavada’. The Mumbai-based Terracon Ecotech Pvt Ltd prepared a database of 26,14,363 trees in all the 10 zones of Nagpur and it is yet to reach the halfway mark. 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 27 months, Garden Superintendent is predicting that it will require six more months to complete the process. Even after so much delay, the previous company has managed to complete the tree count of only five zones. This time, census is underway 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 stopped 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 been completed 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.