NEW DELHI: Bhupender Yadav, Minister for Environment, Forestry, and Climate Change, Government of India, attended the Sustainable Mountain Development Summit-XI (SMDS-XI), which was held in Leh, Ladakh, UT from October 10 to 12, 2022.
The theme for SDMS-XI is ‘Harnessing tourism for sustainable mountain development’. The summit’s major goal is to lessen tourism’s negative effects while maximising benefits to foster socio-ecological sustainability and climate resilience. The minister also emphasised the founding of the G.B. Pant National Institute of Himalayan Environment (GBPNIHE) and its regional office in Leh, which falls under the purview of the Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Climate Change (MOEFCC) and is specifically tasked with conducting research and development for the long-term sustainability of the Himalayan environment. He underlined the necessity for the scientific community to pay special attention to the nation’s many distinctive landscapes, including the Himalayas, Western Ghats, and the Thar Desert.
Research has been carried out by R&D organisations GBPNIHE on a variety of relevant topics such as plant genetics for rapid breeding, digitization of Indian flora and fauna, and reintroduction of Cheetahs in India to improve the state of ecology. The Minister also informed that the work on connecting remote landscapes by building tunnels like Atal Tunnel and ongoing Zoji La Tunnel will reduce carbon emissions in the mountain environment.
The Sustainable Mountain Development Summit (SMDS) is an annual summit of IMI, a civil society-led organization, which is held in the Indian Himalayan Region (IHR). IHR consists of 10 mountain states, two union territories, and four hill districts. The Mountain Legislators’ Meet (MLM) and the Indian Himalayan Youth Summit are two other essential parts of the SMDS in addition to the main event.