Need to preserve nature: Peddireddi

Tirupati: Minister for energy and environment Peddireddi Ramachandra Reddy said that man has become greedy and chose to disrespect the nature for which entire mankind has been paying a heavy price in the form of global warming, storms, typhoons, famines, floods, forest fires, etc., He addressed the international conference on 'Sustainable Waste Management and Circular Economy' organised by Sri Venkateswara University and International Society of Waste Management Air and Water (ISWMAW), Kolkata, here on Thursday.

Quoting Mahatma Gandhi, the minister said that 'Mother Earth is having enough resources to meet everyone's need but not enough to meet one's greed'! But one positive aspect out of this is that it has brought humanity together to find sustainable solutions so that the future generations will lead a healthier and happier life, he said.

SV University vice-chancellor Prof K Raja Reddy stated that waste management cannot be done effectively if each and every citizen of the country doesn't take cognizance of the problem. The international community has to come together and formulate proper laws and policies to prevent the dumping of harmful waste into our ecosystem and the research and development are to be prioritised to find innovative waste disposal solutions.

Co-chair of the conference Mohanty from Japan opined that there is urgency of protecting rivers from getting polluted by creating awareness among the public and enforcing law strictly on the sources of pollutants from industries.

Sri City MD Ravindra Sanna Reddy, Nelles from University of Rostock, Germany, Prof Sadanand K Ghosh, president of ISWMAW, Koklata, SV University rector Prof V Srikantha Reddy, registrar Prof OMD Hussain, APPCB EE Narendra, convenor of the conference Prof S Varadarajan SV Engineering College principal Prof R V Satyanarayana, dean R&D, Prof S Vijaya Bhaskar Rao, director IIT, Tirupati Prof K Satyanarayana and SVIMS director Prof B Vengamma were among the others who attended the conference. On this occasion, SV University signed three MoUs of which one is with Ramcharan & Co Organisation, based at Chennai to provide support, infrastructure , R&D equipment required for carrying out research in the field of sustainable waste management to the university. The second MoU was entered with a startup in waste management, Ecopi.

It will help in design, development and commercialisation of automation of garbage collection while the third MoU was inked with KSS Enterprises, another startup working on electronic waste.