PANAJI(GOA) As promised by the Goa Forward party, the BJP led coalition government introduced the Goa Preservation of Trees (amendment) Bill 2017 proposing to grant Coconut as ‘State Tree’ status.

The government in its common minimum programme had promised to reclassify coconut from palm to tree and declare it as State Tree.

In that direction, a Bill was introduced by Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar before the State Legislative Assembly.

The Bill seeks to insert a new section 7A to the Act so as to empower the Government to declare the coconut tree as State Tree.

“Government may have regard to ecological, socio-economic, cultural or heritage value, may declare a tree to be a State Tree,” the Bill stated.

The Bill also encourages commercial plantation that is trees grown for commercial purposes on private non-forest land.

The Bill has also proposes to replace the old, unyielding coconut palms with new ones and for removing the coconut palms which are likely to cause danger to life of property. “For this purpose, application has to be made to agriculture officer, having jurisdiction of the area, who shall deal with the same as prescribed,” it stated.

It may be recalled that then Laxmikant Parsekar led government had decided to declassify coconut as tree, the decision that sparked severe protest across cross section of society.
Team TNV