ENVIS Hub, Punjab State Council of Science and Technology, Chandigarh in collaboration with SciRox, Science Club of Guru Nanak Dev University and under the aegis of Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, conducted a One-day national webinar on 06 July 2021, to celebrate the week of Van Mahotsav.
- The first speaker of the day was Dr. Manoj Kumar who spoke on sustainable forest management in India.
- The second speaker of the day was Dr. Rajiv Chaturvedi who spoke on state of Indian forest and challenges ahead. The event was organized on Zoom Platform.
The lecture will be also available on the YouTube channel of SciRox so that it can be accessed by a wider audience. Dr. Bindiya Arora, Convener, SciRox, Dr. Anish Dua, Dean Students’ Welfare, GNDU as the chief guest, and Mrs. Ravleen, Senior Program Officer, Environment division, PSCST were also present during the event. Session Host: The session was hosted by Dr. Bindiya Arora, Convener and Mr. Yatin Batra, Student President, SciRox, GNDU in which they welcomed all the dignitaries and the speakers of the event. They thanked ENVIS hub, Punjab State Council for science and technology for giving SciRox this opportunity to celebrate Van Mahotsav week. They also explained the significance of this day mentioning the significance of flora and fauna in our lives.
First Speaker: Dr. Manoj Kumar who is working as Scientist and In charge, GIS Centre, IT & GIS Discipline, Forest Research Institute Dehradun.
Brief Summary of his lecture: Sustainable Forest management refers to the use of forest in a way that maintains their biodiversity and productivity now and in future.The main objective of Sustainable Forest management is to conserve biodiversity ensuring equitable sharing of responsibilities in forest management, supply of food, security to cultural and livelihood needs of forest dependent communities.
Earlier Forestry working plans were oriented to get sustained yield of timber but now this has shifted towards the concerns of ecosystem services environmental stability biodiversity conservation water yield soil moisture and retention pharmaceutical requirements. Forestry in India is managed on the lines of modern scientific management.
Evolution of forest management in India emerged after the era of a regulated exploitation in 1906.Systematic research in Forestry began with establishment of Emperor Forest Research Institute, Dehradun.
In his concluding remarks, he shared that he represented Indian national Action Plan on climate change and national mission for green India and shared climate change impacts on forest ecosystem.
Second Speaker: Dr. Rajiv Chaturvedi who is an assistant professor, BITS Pilani, Goa campus.
Brief Summary of his lecture: The forest conservation act 1980 is an act of the Parliament of India to provide for the conservation of forest. This policy has been a landmark policy for Indian forests. It aims to protect and preserve the Flora Fauna and other diverse ecological components. The forest conservation Act was the first legal draft that ensures to put a restriction on the use of forest land and deforestation.
The changes in climate are directly affecting the state of forests in India. Climate disturbances lower down forest productivity and affect the habitat of various species that ultimately affects mankind. The arising climate changes like rise in temperature, declining monsoon rainfall, unseasonal and extreme events of rainfall in some regions over the years have aggravated the situation to the worst case.
For Climate Change management, India has to fulfill its objectives that are meeting its long-term goal of 33 % GA under forest cover and also the NDC target.
At last, Dr. Rajiv described about possibilities of future climate change objectives as per scientific perspective and then presented us with reality of current system and its loopholes. He suggested that there is an urgent need of improvement to cope up with the emerging challenges by the combined efforts of Government and citizens. The session ended with a vote of thanks by Dr. Bindiya Arora and Mrs. Ravleen.
