Kerala’s school weather station programme made a great impression on participants at the 45th Indian Geography International Conference organised by the National Association of Geographers India (NAGI) at Pune University early this month.
Suresh Kumar S., a Geography teacher from Tirur, said the programme prompted some participants to implement it in their institutions. Pravin Kokane, assistant professor, University of Mumbai, expressed the wish to implement the project in the varsity, said Mr. Suresh.
This year, the conference had good participation from Kerala, and five papers were presented by participants from the State. Among them was ‘Open source GIS insights: evaluating anthropogenic landslip risks in the upgraded NH corridor in Idukki district’ by Benoy V.V., Subash Krishnan K., and Kannan V.L.
The study said the unscientific road widening works on Old Gap Road along the Devikulam-Munnar route resulted in a series of landslips in the area. It is evident that the frequency and the number of landslips were higher during the construction of the national highway segment. It pointed out that the work to widen Gap Road in the hilly tracts of the Kochi-Dhanushkodi national highway was not preceded by a study on its possible negative impacts and ways to prevent them.
“It is now widely accepted that development plans should not be cast in a rigid framework but ought to be tailored to the prevalent locality and time-specific conditions with full participation of local communities, a process that has been termed adaptive co-management,” said the report. What should be ‘go’ and what should be ‘no go’ development options should be decided on a case-by-case basis in tune with the specific environmental and socio-economic context and aspirations of the local communities. “Such a system of adaptive co-management would marry conservation to development and not treat them as separate, incompatible objectives,” the study said, citing the report of the Western Ghats ecology expert panel (part I) prepared by ecologist Madhav Gadgil.
