From Bhupen Goswami
GUWAHATI : Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal on Monday inaugurated the 5 th North East Green Summit at IIT, Guwahati which is organised by Vibgyor N.E. Foundation in collaboration with IIT, Guwahati and UN Environment. Speaking at the programme, the Chief Minister highlighted the state government’s initiatives to protect the environment and said that the economy cannot be developed at the cost of the ecology. He informed about the commitment of the state government to plant 10 crore trees in the state and said that it has been a successful endeavour for environmental protection as more than 8 crore saplings have already been planted. Dwelling on the importance of platforms such as North East Green Summit, Sonowal urged the policy makers, environmental NGOs, researchers, academicians, politicians etc attending the Summit to deliberate on various aspects of the environment and come up ways to prepare the future roadmap so that sustainable measures can be taken for preserving the ecology.
COVID-19 pandemic taught how it is important to preserve the sanctity of nature and why timely actions must be taken in this regard, he added. Referring to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision of making Northeast the organic hub of the country, Sonowal hailed the launching of schemes like Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojna by the Prime Minister for providing free LPG connection to poor women to reduce their hardships and minimize deforestation activities in search of cooking fuel. He also highlighted recent collaboration of State Government with the Israeli Government in the agriculture sector and hoped for technological solutions for harnessing the potential of natural water sources for economic development. He also informed about the State Govrenment’s commitment to achieve industrial growth in the state while maintaining environmental balance at the same time. Union MoS for food Processing Rameswar Teli, Commerce and Industries Minister Chandra Mohan Patowary, Manipur MP Rajkumar Ranjan,Singh were also present at the programme where IIT Guwahati Director T. G. Sitharam gave the welcome address and Silchar MP Dr Rajdeep Roy explained the objective of the Summit.
