SPECIAL AREA DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMMES
1. Hill Areas Development Programme (HADP):
A. Problems of Hill Areas: 17.1.1 The crucial environmental problems of the hills are deforestation and soil erosion, both leading to the drying up of water sources, flash floods and decline in the yield of food and cash crops, fodder, fuel and other minor forest produce. Poverty in the hills is directly related to shortages of materials for basic subsistence, specially where, under the traditional land and water management systems, the capacity of land to support the population has already been exceeded.
17.1.2 In many hill areas, intensive human and livestock pressures along with indiscriminate felling of trees for commercial purposes have already led to loss of soil and rapid depletion and destruction of forest cover. Besides, to this, water retention capacity and productivity of land have been adversely affected. These factors have impaired the ecology significantly and also resulted in deterioration in the economic condition for the hill people. Traditional agricultural practices, especially shifting cultivation, have also contributed to destruction of forests and soil erosion. Seemingly harmless activity as prolonged grazing by livestock, especially goats and sheep, have further exposed many hill areas to serious ecological degradation. Development activities like. construction of buildings, roads, dams, large and medium industries and mining etc., have aggravated environmental problems. Consequently, perennial sources of water springs and small streams have dried up in many areas. The major challenge, therefore, is to devise suitable location-specific solutions, so as to reverse the process and ensure sustainable development of the growing population and ecology of the hill areas.
B. Classification of Hill Areas 17.2.1 The responsibility for balanced social and economic development of the hill areas rests primarily with the concerned State Governments.
17.2.2 The bill areas covered under the HADP were the areas identified in 1965 by a Committee of the National Development Council (NDC) and those recommended by the High Level Committee for Western Ghats in 1972. The HADP would continue to be implemented during the Eighth Plan, only in those areas where it is already under operation.
17.2.3 The hill areas of the country fall broadly into the following two categories :
(i) Areas which are co-extensive with the boundries of the State or Union Territory, i.e., Hill States/Union Territories, namely, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Manipur, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Tripura, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram.
(ii) Areas which form part of a State, which are termed as `Designated Hill Areas', namely :
a) Two hill districts of Assam - North Cachar and Karbi Anglong
b) Eight districts of Uttar Pradesh - Dehradun, Pauri Garhwal, Tehri Garhwal, Chamoli, Uttar Kashi, Nainital, Almora and Pithoragarh.
c) Major part of Darjeeling District of West Bengal.
d) Nilgris District of Tamil Nadu.
e) 163 talukas of Western Ghats area comprising parts of Maharashtra (62 talukas), Karnataka (40 talukas) Tamil Nadu (29 talukas), Kerala (29 talukas) and Goa (3talukas).
17.2.4 The area and population of the Hill States and the Designated Hill Areas are detailed in Table 17.1.
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C. Pattern of Funding 17.3.1 The Hill States mentioned in para 17.2.3 (i) above are called `Special Category States'. The amount required for giving Central assistance for their development plans is pre-empted from the divisible pool before making allocations from it to the other States categorised as `Non-Special Category States'.
17.3.2 The Special Central Assistance (SCA) provided for the HADP is additive to normal State Plan funds. This SCA is not meant to be utilised for normal State Plan activities. The schemes under the HADP is to be properly dovetailed and integrated with the State Plan schemes. The schemes undertaken under both these programmes also need to be conceived of and designed to achieve the specific objectives of these programmes and need not be merely conventional State Plan schemes.
D. Hill Areas Development Programme (HADP) - Objectives, Approaches
and Strategies 17.4.1 The programme has been in operation since the inception of the Fifth Five Year Plan in the Designated Hill Areas.
17.4.2 The basic objective of the Hill Areas Development Programme has been socio-economic development of the hills and the people living there in harmony with ecological development. The programmes implemented under the HADP have, therefore, aimed at promoting the basic life support systems with sustainable use of the natural resources of the area covered by the programme.
17.4.3 The approach and the strategy of the HADP has evolved over time. The programmes implemented during the Fifth Plan period were mainly beneficiary oriented. While the emphasis shifted to eco- development in the Sixth Plan, the general tenor of the HADP remained substantially the same as that of the normal State Plan following the same sectoral approach. The Seventh Plan laid particular emphasis on the development of ecology and environment as summed up in three phrases, namely, eco-restoration, eco-preservation and eco- development. It aimed at evolving plans and programmes to take care of socioeconomic growth, development of infrastructure and promotion of ecology of the areas covered by the HADP.
17.4.4 During the last three Five Year Plans, substantial effort and resources were channelised for the development of infrastructure. However, the corresponding growth in the productive sectors of most of the hill economies has not kept pace with the extent of efforts and resources channelised. During the Eighth Plan, attention will have to be focussed on this, especially, in modernising the agricultural practices and small scale industries at household, cottage and village levels. To achieve this, involvement of the people, would be of paramount importance. Actual basic needs of the people have to be met through improved management of their land and water resources.
17.4.5 The following will be the approach and strategy in respect of hill areas development planning:
i) Intensive efforts would be necessary at the implementation level to halt the process of degradation of the hills and improve productivity of land.
ii) Innovative approaches to family planning and welfare to contain the population growth to sustainable levels have to be adopted.
iii) Financial and physical monitoring of the HADP by the State Governments would help improve implementation of various programmes.
iv) Afforestation programme may be popularised through village Panchayats or village authorities, schools and other local organisations, groups and clubs. Private nurseries, especially, of multi- purpose trees which yield benefits like fodder leaves, edible fruits or leaves or flowers, seeds, leaves of commercial value can be encouraged.
v) Application of scientific inputs to agricul- ture and allied sectors, including identification of crops suitable for the agro-climatic zones, multi-purpose species of trees and bushes to meet requirements
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of the people from a well-developed small land area are of special importance. This approach is expected to spare considerable areas for permanent greening programmes, like social forestry or horticultural and serve the long-term objectives of enhancing production on sustainable basis.
vi) Appropriate technologies to bring about localised self-sufficiency and generate alternative means of livelihood, as opposed to heavy dependence on forests, and livestock rearing, can be encouraged.
vii) Use of appropriate technologies to upgrade the traditional productive systems like ag- ricultural operations, livestock rearing, arts and crafts, household and cottage industries, etc., and to reduce drudgery of women in fetching water, fuel-wood, fodder and other demanding daily domestic chores needs to be encouraged on priority. The technologies have to be need-based, more productive, efficient, low-cost, and ecologically sustainable.
viii) Extension services should enlighten and educate people on how to enhance productivity of both cultivated and community land on a sustainable basis in the context of increasing human and livestock pressures.
ix) Consolidation of small and scattered land holdings would help in improving water and land management and ultimately, productivity of the limited land assets of the hills.
x) In many hill areas, land assets are held as common or community property. In such areas, people do not make permanent investments and several other problems also originate from this. To overcome these, local communities have to evolve suitable models of land management that would invite permanent investment and ensure both optimal returns and ecological safety and development.
xi) The State Governments may take a fresh look at their Plan and non-Plan Schemes, forest policies, the land tenure systems, land and water use policies and realign them to eradicate practices destructive to ecology and environment.
xii) In order to reduce pressure on land, quality of livestock, including goats, sheep, pigs and poultry birds has to be improved and their numbers reduced. There is an urgent need for relating livestock population to the bearing capacity of available land. Scrub animals could be systematically culled out. The livestock and cattle improvement programmes need to be integrated with fodder and cattle-feed development, stall feeding and scientific grazing. The land and livestock management systems have to improve rapidly.
xiii) The productivity of pastures and grazing areas needs to be restored and enhanced. The effort should be to meet the requirements of food, fuel- wood, timber and fodder through scientific utilisation of scarce hill resources on sustainable basis from the least land area.
xiv) Development of non-conventional energy and use of non- wood based sources of energy could be encouraged.
xv) Development of watersheds that can meet water requirement of the people and conserve water and soil resources of the area can be taken up for integrated development. For this, a multi- disciplinary approach is considered most appropriate for creating conditions conducive to development of natural and human resources.
xvi) Food security has to be ensured on top most priority. Development of horticulture, sericulture and plantation, especially cash crops having low volume, light weight, high value and long shelf- life, could play an important role in generating employment opportunities, higher incomes and ecologically sound development in hilly areas.
xvii) Area specific marketing infrastructure, especially for perishable produce and its processing, storage and packaging may be
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set up where such surpluses are imminent or evident.
xviii) At the household level, kitchen gardens can be popularised to supplement and enrich the diet of hill people.
xix) Wherever transport linkages have been established and local cultivation of foodgrains is not advantageous, strong Public Distribution System could be extended, provided other adequate income generating avenues exist.
xx) To reduce the use of wood for packaging of horticultural produce, suitable non-wood based packaging materials such as plastics could be increasingly used on a viable basis.
xxi) Incentives that would encourage formation of large viable hill villages might be built into the development effort, so that the overhead input costs to reach amenities and services to them, could be reduced.
xxii) Many hill areas seem to be especially suited to industries that require pollution-free at- mosphere, cool climate and precision skills like electronics, watch-making, optical glasses, sericulture, etc. A number of cottage industries like carpet weaving, handlooms, handicrafts and other village and household based small-scale industries can be encouraged. Due to higher transportation costs in these areas, industries which reduce weight and volume, but add value and increase shelf-life to the locally available raw materials will be advantageous. Large and medium industries may not generally be considered suitable except under favourable circumstances.
xxiii) Rubber plantations have proved successful in certain areas. Wherever degraded tree free land could become available and where rubber plantations could thrive, these could be encouraged.
xxiv) Development of sericulture has good potential in hill areas. A systematic programme of planting feedstock trees for silkworms On all spare patches of land can be taken up. Development of sericulture can provide employment to educated and skilled workers and generate value-adding activities and bring in foreign exchange. However, the programme will call for right quality of graine, prompt payment in cash for the cocoons and primary processing activities at local levels.
xxv) Tourism can be organised as an industry, with due care taken to avoid exploitative use of scarce local resources, especially, water and fuel-wood.
xxvi) Location specific suitable code of conduct for tourists may be evolved so as to maintain the surroundings clean and disease free, protect local ecology and respect local traditions, culture and heritage.
xxvii) Special care needs to be taken to ensure that hill roads are constructed as per traffic needs, scientific design and specifications suited to hill areas, so that the loose soil is contained, proper drainage system is developed and chances of land slides minimised. In such hill areas where the population density is low and the villages are small and scattered over long distances, porter or pony tracks can be built and properly maintained. Road construction should be completed in all respects without delays.
xxviii) Mining can be carried out but with adequate safeguards in favour of ecology during and after the mining operations.
xxix) Resources should not be thinly spread on a large number of projects and schemes. The priority for such ongoing and spillover schemes, projects and programmes which do not benefit people in improving their quality of life or are destructive to ecology, can be reduced down or terminated.
xxx) Shifting cultivation, called `jhum' is mainly practised in nine States of country, ie., seven States of the North Eastern Region, Andhra Pradesh and Orissa. The con-
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tinuation of 'jhum' cultivation reflects the inadequate attention paid to the development of agriculture. Improvement in agricultural practices, development of land for permanent cultivation, increase in 'Jhum 'land productivity and lengthening of 'Jhum ' cycle, will help in blunting the destructive edge of the practice. In comparatively isolated areas, permanent cultivation on scientific lines for localised self-sufficiency in food seems to be a strong viable solution to the problem. Simultaneously, development of location specific alternative income generating occupations can continue.