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AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHS - A TOOL FOR OBTAINING AREA INFORMATION FOR 
FOREST BASED INDUSTRIAL FEASIBILITY STUDIES IN BASTAR 
By 
Dr.M.N.Tandon, Site Assessment Officer (Inventorv), Madhya 
Pradesh Forestry Technical Assistance Project, Jagdalpur (India) 
1. Introduction 
Aerial photographv as a tool for forestry puroose is being use- 
fullv employed in a variety of wavs from one region to the other. 
However indications of their limitations within each forest re- 
gion have become apparent firstly because of the non-availabili- 
ty of proper photographs at proper time to the foresters and 
secondly because of such factors as forest tvpe, topographv, 
stand density, age and characteristics of individual tree 
species etc. etc. Thus it is essential to know the limits with 
in which information can be extracted from aerial photographs 
in the light of modern developments of photographic and photo- 
interpretation equipments within each of the forest regions. 
Many recent techniques of taking and interpreting aerial photos, 
developed and recommended for forestrv purposes are still un- 
known among foresters or not vet applied for forestry purposes 
in many of the countries or regions. Particularlv for the deve- 
loping nations like India - havirÿ some 75 million ha of forest 
area and a variety of forest types - it is necessary that the 
use of aerial photographs for forest management or regional 
forest industrial planning is made freely. Such use of air 
photos would furnish results more quickly and economically than 
bv traditional ground methods. In a study carried out by 
HILDEBRANDT, 1957 the time saving compared with ground methods 
works out to some 50 to 70 percent depending on forestrv con- 
ditions;topographv, staff and scope of business etc. 
The improved techniaues now available offer varietv of fields 
of application of aerial photographs for forestrv planning. 
This paper deals with one such example of application of aerial 
photographs for forestrv feasibilitv studies being carried out 
in Bastar region. 
2. About Bastar, its forests, and forest management 
Land locked and sparsely populated, Bastar is a pre-dominantly 
forested territory in the state of Madhva Pradesh, India. Bastar 
constitutes one of the richest single forested regions in India. 
Out of the total geographical area of the district which is 
39,176 km? the extent of forest area is 22,882km? (56%). In the 
national context, it works out to some 3$ of total forest area 
whereas it constitutes some 13% of the state forest area. In 
terms of growing stock and potential vield also, it is prominent 
indeed. It contains some 7$ (187 million m? according to FAO 
Report, 1970) of the total growing stock of Bamboo according to 
Pre-investment Survey of Forest Resources Organisatior. This is to 
the tune of 4.2 million tonnes. The potential annual cut from 
these areas has been estimated as nearly 3.14 million m? of 
timber and fuel and 0.32 million tonnes of Bamboo.