Biodiversity committees remain dysfunctional

Lack of awareness about mandate, responsibilities

March 16, 2015 12:00 am | Updated 05:43 am IST - Thiruvananthapuram:

Kerala may be the first State to have Biodiversity Management Committees (BMC) in all local self-government institutions, but most of the committees are not functional and remain only on paper, mainly due to the lack of awareness about its mandate and responsibilities.

The Kerala Grama Panchayat Association feels that BMCs in Kerala have largely failed to serve their purpose.

Association president P.T. Mathew said very few of the committees had taken up meaningful grassroots-level biodiversity conservation projects. A majority of the BMCs had failed to exercise their powers and responsibilities, primarily due to the lack of awareness about their role, he said.

At a meeting held here recently in connection with the second National Biodiversity Congress, he said BMC meetings were seldom convened by local bodies. Mr. Mathew said the failure to operationalise BMCs had affected the preparation of panchayat biodiversity registers.

It was in 2012 that the State government formally declared the constitution of BMCs in all the 978 gram panchayats, 60 municipalities, and five corporations in Kerala. The committee was chaired by the president of the grama panchayat, chairperson of the municipality, or Mayor of the Corporation.

The primary function of the BMC is to maintain a Panchayat Biodiversity Register (PBR) — a document on local biological resources and associated traditional knowledge.

Its mandate also includes the conservation, sustainable use, and documentation of biodiversity and equitable sharing of benefits arising from its use.

The BMC is tasked with regulating access to bio-resources for commercial and research purposes. It has to develop a local biodiversity fund and devise strategies to conserve local biodiversity. It is also tasked with initiating proposals for declaring biodiversity heritage sites and maintaining germplasm bank and seed centres for promoting traditional plant varieties and animal breeds.

After election

Admitting that BMCs in Kerala were by and large inactive, KSBB chairman Oommen V. Oommen said the board would make them operational after the elections to local bodies this year. Prof. Oommen who had embarked on a contact programme in seven districts this year said he was dismayed by the lack of understanding about BMCs' role. “The success stories have been exceptions rather than the rule,” he said.

Prof. Oommen said KSBB was planning to join hands with the Kerala Institute of Local Administration (KILA) for a mass contact programme involving BMCs. “We will also bring out a green book to highlight the importance of biodiversity,” he said.

Primary task is to maintain a biodiversity register

KSBB to organise a mass contact programme

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