Dialogue Highway to prepare recommendations for policy making

Two-day international Dialogue on Himalayan Ecology concludes
Chandigarh, January 29, 2017: The IInd Himalayan Dialogue on Himalayan ecology has attracted attention of the United Nations, Union Environment ministry and National Green Tribunal. “The Nairobi-based United Nations Environment
Programme (UNEP), Union Environment Minister Anil Madhav Dave and National Green Tribunal (NGT) have asked the organisers of the dialogue on ‘Economics of Ecosystems Services’, the Chandigarh-based Dialogue Highway Trust, to send the conclusion and recommendations to them. The recommendations would be assessed for policy planning,” Dialogue Highway managing trustee Devinder Sharma announced today at the conclusion of the two day exercise to develop a methodology for
valuing eco-system services here at Panjab University. The dialogue was held in collaboration with the Department of Environment Studies of Panjab University which was conducted at Golden Jubilee Hall.

Dialogue Highway Trust which has alliance with an international body Dialogues on humanity in France is extensively working on the alternative ways of life.

While talking about the road ahead, a point came up to propose to the Union finance minister a mechanism to incorporate eco-system valuation in the finance bill to unleash a green economy in the age of climate change challenges as valuation of eco-system services is “poor man’s GDP”.

Mr Sharma also announced that students of the department of environment studies will prepare a document on valuation of Sukhna Lake soon. He informed that the Sukhna evaluation has to be attempted on the lines of the Dal Lake.

In today’s session the moderator, Dr. Somnath Bandyopadhyay, Nalanda Universty suggested that a framework for valuation methodology for Himalyan ecosystem should be created. The Dal Lake evaluation was done as a workshop in the last phase of the session today to understand valuation procedures for any eco-system service. On this occasion, Dr M P Sood, former secretary, Government of Himachal Pradesh spoke on the strength of farmers and considered them the real economists. He
suggested that farmers’ help should be taken in the decision making processes because they stay very close to the ecology. Apart from this, S C Dhiman, ex-chairman, Central Ground Water Board, New Delhi spoke on the preservation of water and shed light on the importance of monsoon. In yesterday’s technical session Anil Joshi, Director HESCO, Dehradun had concluded that ecology is the permanent economy.