Page 515 - Environment
Merkel rejects EU proposal for sharper emissions cuts targets
BERLIN (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel rejected on Sunday a proposal, floated by the European Commission last month, of setting new, stricter emissions cuts targets, saying EU countries should focus on meeting the targets they have already set themselves.
Jharkhand farmers visiting Israel to learn new techniques
Jharkhand Chief Minister Raghubar Das today sent off a group of 26 farmers, accompanied by state government officials, to Israel to learn new techniques in farming there. Addressing the farmers before their departure, Das asked them to learn the new techniques minutely and and use those methods in their own farming. Israel is a country geographically smaller than Jharkhand, but its per capita income is greater than that of India, the chief minister said. Jharkhand is now lagging behind in grain production but the day is not far when it would not only become self-sufficient in producing grains but also would supply grains to other states, Das said. He called upon people to go for pisciculture, animal husbandry, horticulture, besides farming. In their four-day trip, the farmers would visit dairy farms, production units of fruits and vegetables and learn about functioning of drip irrigation, Agriculture Secretary Puja Singhal said. Agriculture Director Ramesh Gholop, ...
Green group favours impact assessment of each hydro project in Himachal
Environment group Himdhara Collective on Sunday sent a letter to the expert committee of the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, demanding cumulative impact assessment of each hydropower project on the Satluj river basin.
IMD predicts heavy rainfall in Odisha for 2 days
Several parts of Odisha are likely to experience heavy rainfall for the next two days, under the impact of a low pressure formed over the Bay of Bengal, the Met office said on Sunday.
Heavy rain lashes Odisha, more shower in next two days: Met
Heavy rain lashed several parts of Odisha today due to a low pressure over the Bay of Bengal with the Meteorological centre here forecasting more shower for the next 48 hours. The low pressure area over the north-west Bay of Bengal, which is likely to become well marked by tomorrow, triggered rainfall in most parts of the state with heavy to very heavy rainfall at some places in western and interior region, it said. Under its impact, there would be heavy rainfall in Puri, Ganjam, Khurda, Cuttack, Mayurbhanj, Balasore, Kalahandi, Boudh, Sonepur and Sundargarh districts in the next 24 hours, it said. Similarly, extremely heavy rainfall is on cards in Dhenkanal, Angul, Deogarh, Sambalpur, Balangir, Jharsuguda, Bargarh and Keonjhar districts till August 28 it said. In view of adverse weather conditions, the MeT centre advised fishermen not to venture into the sea along and off Odisha coast and north-west Bay of Bengal. Those who have gone for deep sea fishing have been ...
Climate expert for steps to protect ecologically-sensitive Western Ghats
The recent occurrence of extreme rainfall events and associated floods in Kerala that killed many and rendered thousands homeless were due to climate change, a noted climate expert said today. Chandra Bhushan, Deputy Director General of New Delhi-based advocacy group Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), said the dam management system in the country will have to be "re-evaluated" taking into account the repeat occurrence of extreme rainfall events and associated flash floods. "The floods in Kerala were caused by climate change and the disaster was exacerbated by bad development practises, particularly on Western Ghats and other ecologically sensitive regions of Kerala," Bhushan told PTI. Over 290 people were killed and lakhs of people have been displaced due to the heavy rains and floods in Kerala. He also said the extreme rainfall events and associated flash floods occurred in this century in many parts of the country including in Uttarakhand, Jammu and Kashmir and Chennai, ...
India-France to begin work on maritime surveillance satellites next year
India and France will commence work on launching a constellation of maritime surveillance satellites next year, an official from the French space agency said. The study, which has taken on board views of all stakeholders including the maritime security agency of the two countries, will chalk out the schedule of the exercise. The satellites will be designed to cover areas ranging from the Mediterranean Sea to the Indian Ocean and parts of the Pacific Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean, keeping in mind the interests of both the countries, the official said. The study will access the number of satellites required in the constellation. In March this year, India and France unveiled a joint vision for space, resolving to strengthen cooperation between the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and CENS, the space agency of France. "ISRO and CNES would work together for design and development of joint products and techniques, including those involving Automatic Identification System, to monitor
NASA spacecraft gets first glimpse of asteroid Bennu
NASA's asteroid sampling spacecraft has caught its first glimpse of its target Bennu last week and begun the final approach towards it after an almost two-year journey. The Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) obtained the image of the asteroid from a distance of 2.1 million kilometre on August 17 using its PolyCam camera . OSIRIS-REx is NASA's first mission to visit a near-Earth asteroid, survey the surface, collect a sample and deliver it safely back to Earth. The spacecraft has travelled approximately 1.8 billion kilometre since its 2016 launch and is scheduled to arrive at Bennu on December 3 this year. "Now that OSIRIS-REx is close enough to observe Bennu, the mission team will spend the next few months learning as much as possible about Bennu's size, shape, surface features, and surroundings before the spacecraft arrives at the asteroid," said Dante Lauretta, OSIRIS-REx principal investigator at the University of ...
Floods ravage Karnataka coffee estates, facing heavy losses
With heavy rains and floods devastating Karnataka's Kodagu district, the country's largest coffee-growing region is staring at heavy losses as many of its plantations are in ruins, a top official said.
26 Jharkhand farmers leave for Israel
Jharkhand Chief Minister Raghubar Das said on Sunday that a 26-member farmers' team left for Israel on a four-day trip to study farming techniques.
Kerala fears 4 to 5% decline in tourist arrivals due to floods
Flood-ravaged Kerala, for which tourism is the mainstay of its economy, is staring at 4 to 5 per cent decline in footfalls if the sector does not pick up from October, a senior tourism official has said. The state is reeling under devastating floods, the worst since the 1924 deluge, which has left over 230 people dead and pushed over 1.5 million people into relief camps. The busiest airport in Kochi has been shut since August 16 and is expected to resume operations only from August 29. The Kochi and Ernakulum regions, which have been under the waters for almost two weeks, alone accounts for around 52 per cent of all tourism in the state, according to a Care Rating report. "We had a good first quarter with a full 17 per cent growth. However, the second quarter saw a 14 per cent decline in footfalls due to the Nipa virus that struck the state in April-May," Kerala Tourism director P Bala Kiran told PTI over phone from Thiruvananthapuram. "August and September were ...
Afforestation of marginal lands in Rajasthan, Gujarat will help reduce dust pollution in Delhi: TERI
Afforestation of agriculturally marginal lands in Rajasthan and Gujarat would help in effectively reducing dust pollution in Delhi, which recently witnessed severe deterioration in air quality due to dust storm in neighbouring states, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) has said. A massive dust storm wreaked havoc in Alwar, Dholpur and Bharatpur districts of Rajasthan in May, and claimed over 100 lives. The dust storm also led to deterioration in air quality in Delhi to "severe" level. The drop in air quality brought into light the new phenomenon of summer pollution due to increase in the presence of coarser particles in the air carried by dust storm. Prodipto Ghosh, a distinguished fellow at TERI, said that one of the most effective ways of reducing dust pollution in Delhi is afforestation. "Dust is mainly coming from the northwest part of the country. So if we focus our INDC targets on marginal lands in Rajasthan and Gujarat region, then large-scale afforestation on them ...
Environmental experts ask govt to finalise national clean air programme
Environmental experts have asked the government to urgently finalise a national clean air programme with specific time-bound and sectoral targets for pollution reduction after a recent study suggested that air pollution shortens an average Indian's life by over 1.5 years. It is high time that the government comes out of their "denial mode" of international studies which quantified the number of deaths caused by air pollution, they said. The experts claimed the government has not published any concrete study on the issue for many years now. In a recent study, scientists said ambient air pollution shortens an average Indian's life by over 1.5 years, and suggested that better air quality could lead to a significant extension of human lifespan around the world. Researchers from University of Texas at Austin in the US had said that if PM2.5 concentrations worldwide were limited to the World Health Organization's (WHO) air quality guideline concentration of 10 microgrammes per square cubic .
MP govt seeks revival of cheetah reintroduction project
The Madhya Pradesh forest department has written to the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) to revive the plan to reintroduce cheetahs in the state's Nauradehi Wildlife Sanctuary. The ambitious project, conceived in 2009, had hit a roadblock for want of funds. The country's last spotted feline died in Chhattisgarh in 1947. Later, the cheetah -- which is the fastest land animal -- was declared extinct in India in 1952. "We have written a letter to the NTCA seeking revival of the cheetah reintroduction project in Nauradehi sanctuary located in MP's Sagar district. We have sought its stand on the project," MP's Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife) Shahbaz Ahmad told PTI. The MP forest department would need finances from the Centre for the project, he said, adding that the NTCA, a statutory body under the Union environment ministry, had committed Rs 50 crore to the state for it in 2011. The Wildlife Institute of India (WII) at Dehradun had prepared a Rs
Mazagon Dock rebuilding Kerala anganwadis
Officials from the Mumbai-based Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDSL) were working overtime to make sure that water-logged anganwadis in the worst affected Kerala districts were getting cleaned up, a company executive said here on Sunday.
Tie 'rakhi' to trees, take pledge to protect them: Vardhan
On the eve of Raksha Bandhan, Union Environment Minister Harsh Vardhan today appealed to the people to tie 'rakhi' to trees and take a pledge to protect them. The minister urged people to work towards saving the environment by celebrating a "green Raksha Bandhan". "Celebrate a Green #RakshaBandhan this year tie #Rakhis to trees & take a pledge to protect them. Protect our green brothers; protect the environment - a #GreenGoodDeed towards a #GreenSocialResponsibility. @moefcc," he tweeted. Raksha Bandhan centres around tying of a thread on the wrist, symbolising bonding between brothers and sisters, and sense of protection and caring for each other. The environment ministry had launched a "Green Good Deeds" campaign, a societal movement to protect environment and promote good living. Vardhan, who had launched the nationwide movement, had also drawn up a list of over 500 green good deeds. The minister had asked people to alter their behaviour to green good behaviour to fulfil their
Def ministry says Ktka minister's behaviour unfortunate; state govt hits back at Sitharaman
A day after the public spat between Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Karnataka Minister Sa Ra Mahesh over her itinerary, the defence ministry today termed his conduct as "unfortunate", but the state government hit back saying it was not inferior to the Centre and she should have shown respect to its minister. Sitharaman was speaking at the district commissioner's office with a group of affected people of Kodagu district, where torrential rains had left a huge trail of destruction and claimed at least 17 lives, when Mahesh suggested that she wind up the interaction as a number of government officials were waiting for a meeting with her. Sitharaman, a Rajya Sabha member from Karnataka, reacted tersely saying she was going by the itinerary approved by the state authorities. "I am following a minute-to-minute programme, minister. I do not violate that. If officials are important, my parivaar (family) is also equally important. I follow the minister-in-charge. Central minister ...
Def ministry says Ktka minister's behaviour unfortunate; state govt hits back Sitharaman
A day after the public spat between Defence Minister Nairmala Sithraman and Karnataka Minister Sa Ra Mahesh over her itinerary, the defence ministry today termed his conduct as "unfortunate", but the state government hit back saying it was not inferior to the Centre and she should have shown respect to its minister. Sitharaman was speaking at the district commissioner's office with a group of affected people of Kodagu district, where torrential rains had left a huge trail of destruction and claimed at least 17 lives, when Mahesh suggested that she wind up the interaction as a number of government officials were waiting for a meeting with her. Sitharaman, a Rajya Sabha member from Karnataka, reacted tersely saying she was going by the itinerary approved by the state authorities. "I am following a minute-to-minute programme, minister. I do not violate that. If officials are important, my parivaar (family) is also equally important. I follow the minister-in-charge. Central minister ...
Guv tells scientists to bring cheers on the face of farmers
Jharkhand Governor Droupadi Murmu today said scientists will be judged on the basis of their contribution made in bringing cheers on the face of farmers. "Scientists will not be judged on the basis of number of research papers, books and bulletins published, PhD students produced and technologies developed but on the basis of contribution made in bringing cheers on the face of farmers with their socio-economic development and elimination of their pains and predicament associated with farming," she said. Addressing the 57th India Wheat and Barley Research Workers' meet at the Birsa Agriculture University here, Murmu said that agriculture is the backbone of Indian economy and it generates a significant number of employment. "You have to ensure that the benefits of your knowledge and skills reach the most underprivileged population of over six lakh villages of our country. Targets of increased food production to meet the future requirement of our country have to be achieved
Defence Ministry clarifies Sitharaman's spat with K'taka min
Union Minister Nirmala Sitharaman-led Defence Ministry on Saturday issued a clarification over the former's spat with a Karnataka minister during her visit to the flood-hit Kodagu district of Karnataka yesterday.A video of Sitharaman snapping at Karnataka Minister SR Mahesh went viral on social media, where she can be seen talking aggressively with the latter."I am following a minute-to-minute programme, minister. If officials are important, my parivaar (family) is also important.... Central minister follows the minister in-charge here. Unbelievable," Sitharaman, who was in the flood-affected district to take stock of the situation, can be seen telling Mahesh in the video.Clarifying the sequence of events prior to the incident, the ministry, said, "The tour programme of the RM (Raksha Mantri) was finalized by the district administration of Kodagu in consultation with the public representatives. This programme was approved and circulated to all concerned two days prior to RM's ...
