IMPHAL, August 2: The North East Youth Foundation (NEYF) and North East Dialogue Forum (NEDF) have jointly organised a one-day Civil Society Consultation on Climate Change and State Action Plan on Climate Change on August 1.
A joint press release from the organizations said participants of the consultation programme thoroughly discussed on the impact of climate change in the state of Assam.
Addressing the gathering, Jadav Payeng popularly known as forest man said, `Education from the grassroots level is the key to conserve the nature and lower down the impact of climate change` adding that the youths are vanguard culminating solutions for protecting the eco system.
Further putting light on the key issues on impact of climate change, Rahul Mahanta, Department of Physics, Cotton College reiterated that the society as a whole must focus on both scientific and traditional measures to reconstruct the dilapidating ecosystem.
For this to become a success everyone needed to rely on data in order to form a concrete action plan, he said.
Secretary of Guwahati Press Club, Nava Thakuria highlighted very simple yet highly effective and goal oriented solution to build a healthy urban ecosystem.
Simple measures like rainwater harvesting, utilisation of solar energy can help us in minimising climate change, he observed.
NEYF and NEDF have appealed to the Government of Assam to look into few important areas before finalising the forthcoming climate plan such as translation of any existing or proposed draft into Assamese, Bodo and other regional languages which are used in the state of Assam so that people can understand about the planning. Other policies like water, forest, agriculture, land etc policy must be prepared before finalising the climate plan or policy to avoid any contradiction.
All existing policies must be respected before finalising climate policy to avoid any further contradiction, Strong relations with all the departments which are associated to avoid any confusion or controversies amongst people must be set up, SAPCC should adopt Free, Prior Informed Consent of the people of Assam before taking up climate adaptation measures like REDD+, water, land, agriculture etc. Human rights and gender issues related to Climate Change action should be the primary focus before implementing the proposed action plan and Climate action Plan should use the `Do No Harm`™ principles while taking up the action plan at all level of implementation, it said.
Discussion was held on the thematic areas which are proposed in different climate plans with more emphasis on areas like water, agriculture and forest. Participants from different parts of the state representing different originations apart from youths and students took part in one day consultation. The consultation was held at Bosco Reach Out in Guwahati and was moderated by Convener of NEYF, Ranjan K Baruah, the release stated.