Climate Change and Environmental Sustainability

I admire Sri T.N. Dhar .Despite his 89 years,he carries on his responsibilities as Honorary Secretary of Indian Institute of Public Administration(U.P.).When he invited me to preside over  the inaugural session of a daylong of workshop on Climate Change and Environmental Sustainability, I readily agreed.The workshop took place on 21st February,2015(Saturday) at Jawahar Bhawan ,Lucknow,and I presided over the first session .I  anticipated that the audience would not be large ,but I went nevertheless,inspired by the tireless efforts of Sri Dhar  in  taking up  and deliberating  on worthwhile causes.I like his seriousness , professionalism , alertness , energy and leadership.I needed to learn from him .Here is what I spoke there.

   UP climate Change Authority was set up on November 11,2014 and has been registered as society under the Societies Registration Act.UP is the first state in India to set up such an Authority.It has an Apex Committee ,chaired by the Chief Minister of UP, and a governing body chaired by Chief Secretary of UP.It has been sanctioned Rs 5 crores by UP government to meet its expenses.Its main purpose is to work in UP for adaptation and mitigation of Climate Change.

                  Secondly,we have developed and prepared a State Action Plan on Climate Change.I handed over a copy of Plan to Sri Dhar.It has involvement of seven missions , and has projected a resource requirement of Rs 46945 crores for next ten years.It has identified 93 priority activities  for working on Climate Change.

1.Agriculture has 11  priorities including use of organic manures, research and development of biotic stress resistant varieties .

2.Solar energy including solar power generation and solar pumps in irrigation

3.Energy efficiency  including use of LED, energy audit of government buildings and reduction of energy losses.

4.Green UP  including tree plantation , agro forestry ,afforestation and reforestation.

5.Water mission including efficient water management and rainwater harvesting.

6.Sustainable habitat including water supply ,sewerage treatment ,roads , rapid transit systems and energy efficient street lighting.

7.strategic Knowledge creation , management including awareness creation, capacity building ,surveys and research.

                     I also wondered why our global system  failed to implement Kyoto Protocol.Do our world leaders really not have a global outlook?

Our real challenges are five:

1.Creating awareness in every citizen.

2.Developing an attitude that climate change crisis has to be given high priority.

3,We must develop and  have technical and administrative competence.

4.We should have will to govern.

5.We must allocate adequate resources to fight the climate crisis.