The Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA)
According to the environment ministry’s response in the Lok Sabha recently, the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) has so far disbursed Rs 48,606 crore to 32 states.
CAMPA Fund, an amount of Rs 54,000 crore collected over a period of nearly a decade as environmental compensation for destruction of forest land by industries for their business plans, created out of long pending dues of ‘Compensatory Afforestation Fund’ (CAF) ‘Treasury’.
An independent authority – the ‘Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority’ (CAMPA) has been set up to execute the ‘CAMPA Fund’ under the ‘Compensatory Afforestation Fund Act’, 2016.
CAMPA Fund
Background:
- With the initial experience of under-utilization of funds collected for compensatory afforestation in states, the Hon’ble Supreme Court ordered the establishment of Compensatory Afforestation Fund and Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) in the year
- In the year 2006, separate bank accounts were opened and compensatory levy deposited in them and Ad-hoc CAMPA was set up to manage the Compensatory Afforestation Fund.
- In the year 2009, the Hon’ble Supreme Court permitted the States/UTs to release an amount of Rs 1000 crore per year for compensatory afforestation and other activities.
- Under this, the National Compensatory Afforestation Fund has been created at the central level and the State Compensatory Afforestation Fund (State Compensatory Afforestation Fund) has been created in the states, which will be subject to the respective Public Account.
- Funding for these funds will come from sources like compensatory afforestation, net present value (NPV) of forest and other project wise payments.
- 10% of the amount received will go to the national treasury and the remaining 90% will go to the state treasury.
‘Compensatory Afforestation’
Compensatory Afforestation (CA) is defined as the process of afforestation, and associated regeneration activities are done to compensate for destroyed forest land that has been diverted to non-forest activities. In this context, non-forest activities mean the clearing of a forest or just a small part for the following purposes: Coffee cultivation, rubber, tea, plants with oil, medicinal plants or gardening crops. This may be for the purpose of personal use or for business use–or any other purpose other than the reforestation of the forest.
Source – The Hindu