With the objective to provide a quantitative assessment of the plantations along the National Highways, NHAI has released the first-of-its-kind Annual Report on the National Highways Green Cover Index (NH-GCI) 2025–26. The report has been prepared in coordination with the National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC) of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). The initiative aims to provide a scientific and quantitative assessment of green cover within the Right of Way (RoW) along the National Highways network by leveraging advanced space-based technologies.

The assessment is derived from chlorophyll content detected through high-resolution satellite sensors, enabling an objective, technology-driven measure of vegetation presence along the left and right sides of the highways. NH-GCI is reported as a percentage value that represents the proportion of land covered by green cover within the RoW of National Highways at a granularity of one kilometre.

In this first assessment cycle, approximately 30,000 km of National Highways spanning 24 States have been covered for the period July–December 2024. Subsequent annual cycles will track year-on-year changes to monitor progressive improvements in green cover.

The initiative has been taken under a three-year Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that NHAI signed in January 2024 with the National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC), Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). This innovative approach offers a robust, reliable, cost-effective, and time-efficient mechanism for macro-level estimation of the green cover along the National Highways. The findings will enable comparison, ranking, and targeted interventions for improved plantation management.

The NH-GCI initiative reflects NHAI’s strong commitment to enhancing environmental sustainability and advancing the green transformation of the National Highway network. A copy of the report is available on the NHAI website. Read the report by clicking the following link:

https://nhai.gov.in/nhai/sites/default/files/mix_file/NRSC_NH-GCI_FinalReport_09Dec2025.pdf

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