Jairam Ramesh, after releasing the Wetland Atlas of India prepared by the Space Applications Center, ISRO, Ahmedabad, said they are now equipped to identify the wetlands of national importance with the help of this atlas.
Keen to protect the wetlands of the country, the minister of environment and forest Jairam Ramesh after releasing the Wetland Atlas of India prepared by the Space Applications Center, ISRO, Ahmedabad, said they are now equipped to identify the wetlands of national importance with the help of this atlas.
The Ramsar certification is an international recognition of the need for conservation of a wetland. There are 25 Ramsar sites in India, but none in Gujarat. Ramesh said despite repeated requests, most states, including Gujarat, have not sent proposals for getting their wetlands Ramsar certified.
"So now we can protect our wetlands directly. We will now designate wetlands of national importance ourselves and initiate the conservation measures required. The first land offered for development are wetlands as they are innocuous tracts of land, but they perform very crucial ecological processes," Ramesh said.
In his signature buoyant mood, Ramesh visibly lightened the otherwise grim environs of SAC campus. Gujarat's forest officers Principal Secretary, environment and forests SK Nanda and principal chief conservator of forest Pradip Khanna attended the event. When asked pointed questions by the media, he happily left it to Nanda to defend the state's actions.
In another important announcement, the minister reiterated their commitment to biodiversity conservation by announcing a fund of Rs 120 crore to be released over the next six years for two ecologically sensitive areas - Askote in Uttarakhand and Little Rann of Kutch.
"The main aim of this project is to allocate funds for rural community development, in this case the Agariyas in LRK. There are 600 protected areas in India constituting 5% of India's land mass. We will gradually expand to other areas too," he added.
Taking an indirect dig at his long-time nemesis RK Pachauri and perhaps even Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi who has written a widely-publicised book on Climate Change, he remarked that Climate Change these days is more about politics and less about science.
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