The 24th edition of Kerala Science Congress which began here on Sunday would draw up an action plan for adaptation strategies to fight the adverse impact of climate change in the State, V N Rajaeskharan Pillai, executive vice president, Kerala State Council for Science, Technology and Environment has said. Delivering his presidential address at the opening session of the Congress, Prof Pillai said that the need was to develop adaptation measures that deal with climate variability and build upon existing land and water management practices which have the potential to create resilience to climate change, and thus directly contribute to development.
Stressing on the urgency of adaptation strategies, Prof Pillai pointed out that implementation of innovative technological practices and adaptation strategies at the appropriate levels was essential for mitigation of impact of climate change. The major part of the deliberations at the Congress would be centred around the global issues of climate change along with its contextual implications on water and land management, agriculture, and plantation crops and spices, he said and added that this would contribute to formulate the corpus of knowledge to empower the society to make informed decisions on options for mitigation and adaptation strategies.
That the poor were the most vulnerable to the impact of climate change gives the fight against climate change an extra dimension, Prof Pillai said and underscored the need to focus on water related issues since water was the primary medium through which climate change influenced earth’s ecosystem and livelihood of the societies.
The informed information processed by the media played a key role in stimulating policy debate and also help mobilise knowledge to empower societies. Dedicated collaboration among the media to share and disseminate climate change information that incorporate both global and local perspectives would encourage individuals and policy makers to undertake timely action, he said.
Prof Pillai emphasised the need for setting up scientific institutions and launching new initiatives in the realm of science and pointed out that Kerala had been a pioneering State for all major movements in science in the country, whether it was the space programme from VSSC or IT revolution through Keltron. It was in fact, a small church in the coastal village of Thumba which was the founding home of VSSC which led to the spectacular growth in space science leadership which has now reached to the Chandrayan project, he said.
The KSCSTE has decided on a series of initiatives for promoting science he said. This include institution of the Kerala Sasthra Puraskara and launching of an INSPIRE like programme. The proposed Wetland Research Institute will come up in Kottayam. Sreenivasa Ramanujan Institute of Basic Sciences is also in the pipeline.
