New Delhi to expedite its activities in central Indian Ocean; MoES to recruit 500 earth system specialists.
The Indian Ocean bed promises to be the next frontier for earth system scientists in the country.
India, who has been granted mining rights for 75,000 sq km of the ocean bed in the central Indian Ocean by the International Seabed Authority, plans to expedite its activities in the region.
Speaking to DNA in Pune on Monday, secretary in the ministry for earth sciences (MoES), Shailesh Nayak, said this particular ocean bed was rich in copper, cobalt and manganese.
Nayak said the government had earmarked Rs250 crore for initial research and a team from the National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT), Goa, had carried out research in the area.
Nayak said high quality specialised technology like remote operating vehicles, sensors, soil testers and mining equipment would be used for ocean mining.
The MoES has gone into a recruitment overdrive and will recruit 500 earth system scientists over the next five years. One hundred of these scientists are scheduled to be recruited by March 2012.
Nayak was in Pune on Monday for the induction of the first batch of 20 trainee earth system scientists for the Centre for Advanced Training in Earth System Sciences and Climate (Catessc) at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM).
Highlighting the urgent need for earth system scientists in the country, Nayak told DNA that earth scientists of the future would need to look beyond monitoring the Indian monsoon. "Earth scientists of the future would need to be involved in oceanography, studies of the Arctic and Antarctic, climate change and much more. For this, we urgently need a pool of earth system scientists hailing from multi-disciplinary fields of physics, chemistry and mathematics," Nayak said.
According to Nayak, Rs95 crore was earmarked for the Catessc programme in the 11th five year plan.
After interacting with the 20 trainee scientists at Catessc, Nayak said, "I am extremely happy to see enthusiastic, young talent from multi-disciplinary fields. We hope to scale up the numbers at this centre in the coming years."
Nayak said earth sciences would need to service grass-roots people.
He cited the example of how the agri-meteorology department disseminates agricultural information to 5.5 million farmers in the country, which contributes Rs50,000 crore to the gross domestic product.Shailesh Nayak, secretary in the ministry of earth sciences (R), chats with trainee earth system scientists at the IITM on Monday.
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