The forest department will construct and water conservation structures at an estimated cost of Rs 70 lakh, to revive a few hundred hectares of degraded forest patches in the state.
As per the Union Environment ministrys instructions, the degraded forest patches have already been identified for the state by the Water and Power Consultancy Services (WAPCOS), India.
The detailed project report for Goa submitted by the WAPCOS has already been forwarded to Goa forest officials for implementation and the centrally-funded project has to be implemented in nine months.
WAPCOS has used the Light detection and ranging (LiDAR) technology to identify major ridge areas inside forest areas of Goa. LiDAR is an active remote sensing system used to measure vegetation height across wide areas.
To conserve water under the project, ridge-to-valley approach of Watershed Management will be used. The ridge-to-valley approach detains, diverts, stores and uses available rainwater.