Goa Legislative Assembly approved reclassification of coconut tree as palm

The Goa Legislative Assembly on 15 January 2016 approved reclassification of coconut tree as palm. The reclassification was approved by the legislature through the passage of the Goa Preservation of Trees (Amendment) Bill, 2016.

The bill seeks to omit the Section 1-A of the Goa, Daman and Diu Preservation of Trees Act, 1984. The section, which was inserted through an amendment in 2008, included coconut under the definition of tree.

Further, to facilitate the reclassification, the bill also amended the Section 12-A of the Act incorporating changes into the definition of tree.

As per the new definition, tree means any woody plant whose branches spring from and are supported upon the trunk or the body and whose trunk or body is not less than ten centimeters in diameter at a height of one meter from the ground level.

In the original act, the width of the trunk or body was mentioned as not less than five centimeters in diameter and height as thirty centimeters from the ground.

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