Countries around the world celebrate the International Day for Biological Diversity and on the very date, with an increasing attention towards biodiversity, JICA India Office revealed its plan to further support biodiversity conservation. An impact study is going to be launched in June for reviewing a decade long support for Tamil Nadu Biodiversity Conservation and Greening Project (TBGP).
The impact study will be implemented within 6 months, assessing the effectiveness of each project component. The result of the study and key takeaways will be widely shared with Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and Forest Department of each state.
Since the start of its assistance to the forestry sector in India in 1991 with a project in Rajasthan, JICA has supported 31 projects, with 28 state specific projects. The first project carried out a study to facilitate the designation of the Khangchendzonga National Park as a World Heritage site. In 2016, Khangchendzonga was inscribed to the UNESCO World Heritage Sites list, becoming the first ‘Mixed Heritage’ site of India. Japan’s support to India consists of ODA loans of 270 billion Japanese Yen (approximately Rs 16,300-Crore) since 1991 towards the forestry sector. The total area of afforestation activities under JICA supported projects reaches close to 3 million hectares across Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Nagaland, Odisha, Sikkim, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Tripura.