Ajunlo Kent
MSW 2nd Semester, NEISSR
Nagaland, once celebrated as one of India's greenest states, is today at the centre of an ecological emergency. A land whose hills once breathed with dense, ancient forests and teeming rivers is now losing its natural inheritance at a rate that alarms scientists, forest officers, and community leaders alike.
A Decade of Loss: At the first-ever Nagaland Forest Officers Conference held at Chümoukedima, Principal Secretary Y. Kikheto Sema delivered a sobering assessment: the state recorded the highest forest loss in the country — approximately 800 square kilometres between 2013 and 2023 — an overwhelming figure for a state whose total geographical area is only about 16,700 sq km.
Between 2001 and 2013, Nagaland was losing around 91 sq km of forest annually. Between 2014 and 2021, that figure leapt to 251 sq km per year — nearly three times faster. Despite still boasting a forest cover of 73.9% of its geographical area, the speed of loss is what makes the situation critical.
The Many Faces of Destruction: The forces behind Nagaland's environmental degradation are multiple. Shifting cultivation, or jhum, has seen its fallow cycle shrink from 10–15 years to just 3–5 years due to population pressure, leaving soil with insufficient time to recover. Illegal logging, rapid urbanization, and infrastructure expansion continue to bleed the state's forests. A newer and debatable threat has emerged in the form of large-scale oil palm cultivation, which grew from 140 hectares in 2015–16 to over 4,600 hectares by 2021. The Nagaland Community Conserved Areas Forum, representing 120 villages, has warned this expansion leads to “large-scale deforestation, habitat destruction, and water contamination.”
Biodiversity at the Brink: Nagaland sits within the Eastern Himalayas Biodiversity Hotspot — one of only 34 such zones in the world. The Hoolock Gibbon, Blyth's Tragopan, and the state bird Great Indian Hornbill are among species now facing serious threats. Around 70% of the state's land is prone to erosion, and 29.1% is already under active degradation. Floods and landslides, once exceptional events, are becoming routine.
The Policy Gap: Nagaland remains the only state in India yet to receive any allocation from CAMPA — the Compensatory Afforestation fund — despite over ₹5,883 crore being disbursed to 34 other states. This exclusion, stemming from a misinterpretation of Article 371A, has severely hampered forest restoration work.
Green Shoots of Hope: Communities are fighting back. The Nagaland Community Conserved Areas Forum, grassroots groups like the Bethesda Youth Welfare Association, and youth-led organizations like Green Succession are conducting tree-planting drives, environmental education, and advocacy for sustainable agriculture. Village-level Community Conserved Areas across the state represent some of the most authentic conservation governance in the country.
The Way Forward: Experts and forest officials call for resolving the CAMPA funding deadlock, regulating oil palm expansion in ecologically sensitive areas, strengthening community forest rights, and investing in climate-resilient agriculture. Urban centre’s like Dimapur urgently need better waste management and protection of natural water bodies.
Nagaland's forests are not a resource to be consumed — they are a living inheritance. Whether they are passed on to the next generation depends entirely on the choices made today.
