Afforestation, restoration and conservation outside protected areas

3 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains

Other Effective Area-based Conservation Measures

An OECM is the name for land that lies outside the formal protected area network and still conserves biodiversity in situ over the long term, which is how conservation is counted once it stops at no boundary.

• An OECM counts whoever owns the land, which is what separates it from a notified protected area.
• OECMs count towards Target 3 of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, adopted under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which is the 30x30 pledge.

See also: National Conservation Estate

3 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains

National Conservation Estate

A column in August argued that India should stop counting only its notified parks and hold one estate instead, in which corridors and community land count towards the pledge as well.

• Wildlife overpasses on the Delhi-Dehradun Economic Corridor and mitigation in the Pench-Seoni landscape were offered as proof that infrastructure and connectivity can coexist.

See also: Other Effective Area-based Conservation Measures

The Indian Express, 3 Aug 2026: Next conservation challenge lies beyond protected areas (opens in a new tab)

16 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains

The Green India Mission

The Mission was written to improve the forest that already stands as much as to add new cover, and the auditor measured it against both.

• It targets 1.4 million hectares of improved forest quality, and as much again in added cover.
• It runs on public money and is meant to converge with CAMPA and the rural employment scheme.
• The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) audited it in 16 States and Union Territories from 2015-16 to 2024-25 and found it far behind its own targets.
• Forest quality improved over 0.11 million hectares and forest cover rose over 0.03 million hectares in that decade.
• Weak convergence with CAMPA and the rural employment scheme, thin funding and poor monitoring are blamed.

The Hindu, 16 Aug 2026: CAG audit flags major gaps in Green India Mission implementation (opens in a new tab)

24 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains

The Green Credit Programme

The other way of paying for planting is to price it: land restored to a set standard earns a credit, and the credit discharges somebody's obligation to plant.

• The programme was notified under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 on 12 October 2023, and is run by the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education (ICFRE).
• Its plantation method was notified on 22 February 2024 and revised on 29 August 2025.
• State forest departments register the degraded parcels restored, and that registry and the credits earned on it sit on a public dashboard.
• A credit follows five years of restoration and a canopy density of at least 40 per cent, the line at which forest stops counting as open and counts as moderately dense.
• A credit is usable once, against compensatory afforestation, a statutory plantation requirement or a corporate social responsibility (CSR) obligation.

PIB, 24 Aug 2026: Green Credit Programme rules (opens in a new tab)

1 Sep 2026 · Prelims and Mains

Master Plan for Delhi 2047

Delhi's plan to 2047 treats the Yamuna, the Ridge and the city's heritage as infrastructure the capital has to maintain, each with a programme of its own. That is a change of category: nature stops being the land left over and becomes something the city is obliged to keep working.

• The Master Plan for Delhi is the city's statutory land use plan, prepared by the Delhi Development Authority (DDA).
• A green-blue network plans a city's rivers, drains, wetlands, forests and parks as one connected system rather than as separate parcels of land.
• The Delhi Ridge is an extension of the Aravalli range, among the world's oldest fold mountains.

See also: The Delhi Ridge and the Najafgarh drain

The Hindu, 1 Sep 2026: Green-blue infrastructure and heritage: building a resilient and timeless Delhi (opens in a new tab)

12 Sep 2026 · Prelims and Mains

The Delhi Ridge and the Najafgarh drain

Neha Sinha's Wild Capital: Discovering Nature in Delhi reads the same city from the other end, through its plants rather than its plan. The review takes up the imported tree that took the Ridge, the river that was turned into a drain, and the species that hold on to bare rock.

• The Najafgarh drain is the channelled course of the Sahibi river, which rises in the Aravalli hills of Rajasthan and joins the Yamuna in Delhi.
• A city this dry is mostly scrub country, so its native plants are xerophytic ones built to lose as little water as they can.
• Restoration at the Aravalli Biodiversity Park began by matching native plants to baking sun, desert winds or the shelter of rocks.

See also: Master Plan for Delhi 2047

Frontline, 12 Sep 2026: How green was my Dilli (opens in a new tab)