India is among a few countries in the world where, despite ongoing developmental efforts, forest and tree cover is increasing. A comparison with some other emerging and advanced economies shows that India's growth in forest cover has been positive. In terms of canopy density classes, area covered by Very Dense Forest (VDF) is 99,278 km (3.02 per cent), Moderately Dense Forest (MDF) is 3,08,472 km (9.39 per cent) and Open Forest (OF) is 3,04,499 km (9.26 per cent) (Figure 1.18). The forest and tree cover has reached 80.73 million ha which is 24.56 per cent of the geographical area of the country. The total forest cover of the country, as per the latest assessment (FSI, 2019) is 7,12,249 km which is 21.67 per cent of the total geographic area of the country. There has been an increase of 3,976 km (0.56 per cent) of forest cover, 1,212 km (1.29 per cent) of tree cover and 5,188 km (0.65 per cent) of forest and tree cover put together, at the national level as compared to the previous assessment of 2017 (FSI, 2019).