Working Plan

Introduction

Forestry management in India as well as in Gujarat has passed through various phases. The National Forest Policy of 1988 has recognized the importance of managing our forests on silvicultural principles commensurate with the societal and environmental concerns. It also mentions that no forest be permitted to work without the approved management plan in a prescribed format under forest conservation act. Para 4.3.2 of the National Forest Policy clearly states

"No forest should be permitted to be worked without the Government having approved the management plan, which should be in a prescribed format and in keeping with the National Forest Policy. The Central Government should issue necessary guidelines to the State Governments in this regard and monitor compliance.”

According to National Working Plan Code, Working Plan is a tool for scientific forest management. It is very useful for evaluating the status of forest resource of a division, assessing the impact of past management practices and deciding about suitable management interventions for future. Periodical up-dating and revision of Working Plans is essential to keep pace with the trends emerging out of forest–people interface and to address other national and international obligations. The preparation of Working Plan is a highly technical and time-framed scheduled operation. The preparation of the Working Plan is based on stock maps which is prepared through ground surveys. Recently, the use of modern tools like remote sensing, GIS & GPS is being done for preparing the forest cover maps of divisions. Every Working Plan includes the area-specific scientific prescriptions for proper management of forests of a particular forest division. Accordingly, the working circles, felling series, and annual coupe area computations are done for the plan period for implementation of the Working Plan prescriptions.