Since the Indian Himalayan Region (IHR), which constitutes 16 per cent of the geographical area of the country, provides valuable ecosystem services to more than 500 million people, the management of natural resources in the Himalayan region is an imperative.
This was the view of experts and scientists who attended a workshop on lesson from Uttarakhand disaster for future planning in IHR organised at the Forest Research Institute on Thursday with the Central Himalayan Environment Association (CHEA) in collaboration with Regional Economic Development Programme (RED) of German International Cooperation (GIZ).
The workshop was an attempt to understate the impacts, analysis of the situations and absence of provision that could have reduced the damage to human life, infrastructure, local livelihoods and other aspects of the happening.
FRI director PP Bhojvaid stressed on the need for biodiversity conservation while executing disaster management works. The workshop proceedings highlighted that since time immemorial human wellbeing is directly related to wellbeing of mountains with their snow clad peeks, dense forests and rivers. Being the youngest and loftiest mountains range in the world, the Himalayas are inherently fragile to disasters. IHR is 2500 km long and its breadth varies from 150 km to more than 500 km at different places.
Deliberations highlighted that every year about 1,200,000 million cubic metres of water flows from the Himalayan rivers, which indicates importance of the ecosystem.
The Himalayan ecosystem provides a range of ecosystem services to the country. Several task forces, working groups and scientific organisations have given their recommendations for sustainable development of the region, climate change and active tectonics even as the frequency and intensity of natural disasters is increasing. The recent Uttarakhand disaster is a case in point which has put a question mark on the development model being followed.
Those attending the workshop recommended that it is an imperative to ponder over the entire development priorities of the Himalayan States and find solutions to mitigate the colossal impacts of natural disasters. The lessons learned from Uttarakhand disaster could be valuable for other Himalayan States to prepare themselves accordingly for future.
Prof Shekhar Pathak, Uttarakhand State Council of Science and Technology director general Rajendra Dobhal, Prof Arun Kumar from IIT Roorkee, PS Negi from Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, AK Gupta from National Institute of Disaster Management and Rajeev Semwal from MoEF among others, participated in the deliberations.