GBPIHED :: Global World Environment Day (5th June, 2011)

INDIA - Host Country for WED 2011

The Republic of India will be the host for World Environment Day, 5 June 2011, for the first time since the celebrations began in 1972. This year’s commemorations are expected to be the largest and most widely celebrated globally. India is the second most populous nation in the world with around 1.2 billion people. It has the seventh largest land mass on the planet, 3.28 million square kilometers, providing home to a largely Hindu population.

The country faces serious environmental challenges related to population increase and uncontrolled urbanization, industrialization, and the massive intensification of agriculture. The problems include deforestation, pollution, loss of water resources and wildlife trade. As the economy continues to grow, however, India is seeking solutions to tackle these issues.

Releasing a major report on the assessment of the impact of climate change last year, the Minister for Environment and Forests, Mr. Jairam Ramesh, noted that, “There is no country in the world that is as vulnerable, on so many dimensions, to climate change as India is. This makes it imperative for us to have sound evidence-based assessments on the impact of climate change… We must continue this focus on rigorous climate change science.”

Among some of the rare species found in India are the Golden Langur monkey, which was first discovered in the 1950s, and the Royal Bengal Tiger. The Golden Langur is the most endangered primate in India, named after is beautifully colored coat. It is a secretive leaf-eating monkey that spends most of its time on top of high trees and seldom descends to the ground. They are also found in the foothills of Bhutan's Black Mountains.

India is estimated to have 1,500 of the 8,000 Golden Langurs left in the world. This number however represents a 30% decline in the last 30 years. A major threat to these monkeys is the loss of habitat due to the destruction of forests. Increasingly, the population of this species is restricted to fragmented forest pockets.

This year’s World Environment Day theme – Forests: Nature at Your Service – underscores the need for both conservation and sustainable use of forests. India’s Ministry of Environment and Forests is supportive of this initiative and to date has 39 protected areas for tigers and earmarked 5 more for the near future.

World Environment Day this year will help to raise awareness on the serious impacts of deforestation and forest degradation. This will serve to protect the habitat for species such as the Golden Langur. Through engaging governments in action and your spreading the word on the importance of forests, this collective effort will preserve ecosystems and encourage sustainable use of forests.

India named Global Host of World Environment Day 2011

India is a country of 1.2 billion people who continue to put pressure on forests especially in densely populated areas where people are cultivating on marginal lands and where overgrazing is contributing to desertification. But the Indian Government has also found solutions. While the socio-economic pressures on the country's forests are tremendous, India has instituted a tree-planting system to combat land-degradation and desertification, including windbreaks and shelterbelts to protect agricultural land.

In conserving its critical ecosystem, India has successfully introduced projects that track the health of the nation's plants, animals, water and other natural resources, including the Sunderbans - the largest deltaic mangrove forest in the world, and home to one of India's most iconic wildlife species: the tiger.

India has also launched a compensation afforestation programme under which any diversion of public forests for non-forestry purposes is compensated through afforestation in degraded or non-forested land. The funds received as compensation are used to improve forest management, protection of forests and of watershed areas. Moreover, a government authority has been created specifically to administer this programme. "India is famous for its culture, arts, movies and world-beating Information Technology industries. Increasingly it is at the forefront of some of the 'green shoots' of a Green Economy that are emerging across the globe," he said.

"From its manufacturing of solar and wind turbines to its Rural Employment Guarantee Act which underwrites paid work for millions of households via investments in areas ranging from water conservation to sustainable land management, foundations are being laid towards a fundamental and far reaching new development path," added Mr. Steiner. This is underlined by India's introduction of the Clean Energy Fund into its national budget which provides subsidies for green technology and has been the basis for a National Action Plan on Climate Change which sets specific targets on issues such as energy efficiency and sustaining the Himalayan eco-system.

India is currently planning one of the largest green energy projects in the world that will generate 20,000 megawatts of solar energy and 3,000 megawatts from wind farms on 50,000 acres in Karnataka in southwest India. The first phase of the US$50 billion project will start next year. In its ground-breaking report on the Green Economy launched yesterday, UNEP cites India, where over 80 per cent of the US$8 billion National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, which underwrites at least 100 days of paid work for rural households, invests in water conservation, irrigation and land development. This has generated three billion working days-worth of employment benefiting close to 60 million households.

"India's offer to host WED is another expression of India's strong commitment to work with the global community for sustainable development. This event will serve as the inauguration of a series of events leading up to the hosting of the 11^th Conference of Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity. It will also flag off the celebrations of the international decade for biodiversity. This will in addition signal India's commitment to the biomass economy so dependent on the sustainability of our natural resources," said Dr. T. Chatterjee, Secretary for Environment and Forests of the Government of India.

Two of India's most prominent cities - Mumbai and Delhi - will be the venue for this year's global celebration of the environment, with a myriad of activities over several days to inspire Indians and people around the world to take action for the environment. The celebrations in India on 5 June are part of thousands of events taking place around the globe. WED 2011 will emphasize how individual actions can have an exponential impact, with a variety of activities ranging from school tree-planting drives to community clean-ups, car-free days, photo competitions on forests, bird-watching trips, city park clean-up initiatives, exhibits, green petitions, nationwide green campaigns and much more.

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