HYDERABAD: Shailesh Nayak, Secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences, on Monday called for an integrated and multi-disciplinary approach to tackle the problems arising out of climate change, like rising sea level.
Inaugurating the 16th biennial convention of the Indian Geological Congress (IGC) and a three-day seminar on ‘Climate change and role of geo-scientific community to counter its impacts’ at NGRI, here, he observed that the effects of climate change were already showing.
Dr. Nayak pointed out that the role of earth scientists in mitigating the problems caused by climate change was important. Their attitude had to be much more sincere if ‘we have to understand the phenomenon, both natural and human-induced changes’.
He cited the example of not much attention being paid to the issue of snow cover as also rising sea level due to climate change, which could be variable in the sub-continent.
Monitoring
R. K. Pachauri, chairman, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, highlighted the impact of climate change on the coastal region and island countries, like the Maldives. He said there was no systematic study so far regarding the monitoring of glaciers in the Himalayas and Antarctica. D. K. Pande, president of IGC, said the IGC’s Hyderabad chapter would be launched at NGRI.
More than 200 delegates from within the country and abroad are attending. The seminar sessions would be on water/energy security, geology and natural hazards, mineral-herbal formulations, earth science and its animation in 21st Century and emerging technologies for ore deposits.
V.P. Dimri, NGRI Director, and R.K. Chadha, secretary, organising committee, spoke.
