India has been able to bring 21.76 million hectares of land under restoration efforts, against a target of 26 million hectares for 2030, the country’s second progress report on the Bonn Challenge released by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said on Wednesday.
Union Environment Minister Bhupinder Yadav released the report, which said the progress demonstrates the convergence of policy commitment, scientific innovation and public engagement, which can make environmental restoration an effective path towards sustainable development.
“About 21.76 million hectares of land have been put under restoration efforts to achieve the target of restoring 26 million hectares by 2030 under the Bonn Challenge. India has been continuously promoting sustainable land management as a party to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD),” the minister said, while addressing an event in the national capital.
Read also: Making Delhi dust free is our environmental duty
Launched in 2011, the Bonn Challenge is a voluntary global pledge for global reform. In 2015, India pledged to restore 13 million hectares of degraded and deforested land by 2020, with an additional 8 million hectares by 2030.
The first interim report, issued in 2018, revealed that 9.8 million hectares of land had been returned to the restoration stage. A year later, at the 14th session of the Conference of the Parties, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a revised target to restore 26 million hectares by 2030.
To measure progress, countries use the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Restoration Barometer, which includes the policies, institutional frameworks, financial flows, technical planning and monitoring systems needed for forest landscape restoration (FLR). FLR results in terms of land area undergoing restoration, corresponding climate, biodiversity, and socio-economic benefits resulting from restoration are also included in the progress assessment.
Telangana, with 4.18 million hectares, leads restoration efforts, according to the latest report, followed by Madhya Pradesh (3.78 Mh), Odisha (2.64 Mh), Gujarat (1.73 Mh) and Andhra Pradesh (1.61 Mh).
“All 28 states and seven union territories reported their progress against the restoration metric and collectively succeeded in restoring 21.76 million hectares of land under restoration,” the report said.
Greening and restoration activities have been carried out across about 170,000 hectares under the Green India Mission, while afforestation has been carried out across about 320,000 hectares through CAMPA-supported activities during the last five years, Yadav said.
The minister also said that joint forest management covers about 81.53 million hectares and remains one of the largest community forest management systems in the world. He added that more than 121,000 hectares have been converted to agroforestry, while bamboo plantations have been established outside forests on an area of about 60,000 hectares.
Referring to the ‘Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam’ campaign launched by the Prime Minister, Yadav said over 266 crore saplings have been planted across the country already, adding that the Aravalli Green Wall initiative has emerged as an important landscape level restoration program and has exceeded its annual targets during the financial year 2025-26.
He added that a target has been set to restore 54,000 hectares of mangrove area by 2028 under the Mangrove Coastal Habitat and Tangible Income Initiative (MISHTI) program as well.
