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ITC has helped to bring 11,969 hectares of wasteland under social forestry benefiting 13,492 poor households in 406 villages.
ITC’s social forestry programme
simultaneously addresses the livelihood
problems of marginal farmers and the
ecological imperative of regenerating
biomass and nurturing depleted soils.
In the moisture-stressed districts of
Guntur, Nellore, Khammam, Nalgonda and
Prakasam in Andhra Pradesh, marginal
wasteland owners, who mostly make a
living as farm labourers, are often out of
work for long stretches.
In an innovative move, linking these
farmers’ need for income to the wood fibre needs of its paperboards
business, ITC has enabled them to
convert their wastelands to pulpwood
plantations – a commercially viable
land use alternative that can end
their marginalisation.
ITC organises wasteland owners into
forest user groups who are trained in
silviculture, land development and
plantation maintenance. Extension
services support them with a package of
loans and supplies of high-yielding,
disease-resistant clonal saplings
developed at ITC’s R&D Laboratory at
Bhadrachalam.
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