Coordinated plan to check wetland encroachment

Hyderabad: Encroachers of the wetlands in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh are all set to face a tough time following the Space Application Center (SAC) of Indian Space Research Organisation and the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI), based in Kochi in Kerala have joined hands to unveil a real-time monitoring of the wetlands in the country.

Sources in the TS and AP Biodiversity Boards said the Telugu States have not formed State Wetland Authority (SWA) as per the directions of Wetlands (Conservation and Management) Rules, 2017.

Speaking to The Hans India, a senior official from the TS Biodiversity Board said that as per the rules the SWAs were given a timeline. The authority should the prepare a list of the wetlands in the State concerned in three months and notification of the wetlands within a period of six months.

Besides, it will have to prepare a digital resource of the State Wetland Inventory (SWI) and update the same online at the National Wetland Committee (NWC).

However, till date, both the States have not implemented the Central rules sensing that they might pose trouble in some cases where the wetlands have been encroached.

But, preparing the list of wetlands and notification of the same would lead to the burden falling on the State government to clear any encroachments.

For example, the encroachments Kolleru freshwater lake in Andhra Pradesh have become a sensitive issue for every political party coming in the way of successive governments attempts to conserve the lake.

It was against this backdrop that the SAC of ISRO at Ahmedabad and CMFRI have signed an agreement to come up with a real-time monitoring system of about 5 lakh wetlands in the country.

Giving details of the same, a senior official of the CMFRI regional centre, Visakhapatnam said that it is the first time that a fisheries institute is collaborating with the ISRO for developing a comprehensive climate resilient framework for the fisheries and wetlands.

The real-time wetland advisories could enhance the climatic resilience of the small wetlands in the country.

The project has an objective to find ways for mitigating the impact of climate change on fisheries and further conserve the wetlands.

But, in the process, it is going to come up with a mobile app and a centralised portal with a complete database of more than 5 lakh small wetlands across the country.

In turn, this would put in place real-time monitoring for further conserving the wetlands.

The Indian Council for Agricultural Research and CMFRI, jointly developed the National Innovations in Climate Resilient Agriculture (NICRA) project. The CMFRI has already developed a national framework for fisheries and wetlands under the said project.

Acquisition and integration of the wetland data into a common digital repository, obtaining time to time, information on wetlands from the field level inputs and the geospatial wetland database of ISRO will provide a comprehensive and authentic data with well-defined boundaries of the wetlands to step up the wetland conservations efforts, the sources said.