With Chief Minister Oommen Chandy scheduled to meet Union Minister for Environment and Forests Prakash Javadekar next week, the Kerala State Biodiversity Board (KSSB) has fast-tracked the preparation of a report on the demarcation of ESAs (Ecologically Sensitive Areas) in the 123 villages identified by the K. Kasturirangan Committee for conservation of the Western Ghats. The office of the Chief Minister confirmed that Mr. Chandy would meet Mr. Javadekar in New Delhi on October 16.
The talks are likely to centre on the exclusion of human settlements and agricultural land from the ESAs demarcated by the High-Level Working Group (HLWG) led by Mr. Kasturirangan.
Oommen V. Oommen, KSSB chairman, said the fine-tuning of the ESA maps was in the final stages.
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He said the work was expected to be submitted to Mr. Chandy before he leaves for New Delhi. The block-level cadastral maps demarcating the ESAs are being electronically stitched together to prepare village-level maps.
A report indicating the ESA and non-ESA areas within each survey number is also being prepared.
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The Ministry of Environment and Forests has sought the report for inclusion in the revised draft notification on the Kasturirangan committee, to be issued shortly.
The KSBB had taken up the job of fine-tuning the cadastral maps after paucity of funds forced the Kerala State Remote Sensing and Environment Centre (KSREC) to drag its feet on a project to digitize the ESA maps and convert them to the GIS (Geographic Information System) format.
The cadastral-level maps, with different colour codes to indicate forests, residential areas, waterbodies and rocks, were prepared following a draft notification issued by the MoEF in March redefining the territorial extent of the ESAs in Kerala.
Earlier, the Kasturirangan Committee had earmarked 13,108 sq km across 123 villages in Kerala as ESA.