The Government of India has reportedly announced that it is prepared to roll out its most integrated program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture. Reports claim, the project aims to safeguard the nation’s five biggest ecological landscapes that are vulnerable.
Reportedly, the program will span across the Chambal region in Madhya Pradesh, Similipal in Odisha, Dampa in Mizoram, a national wildlife corridor in Uttarakhand besides Barmer and Jaisalmer in Rajasthan.
Sources claim, the program would be involving the nation’s environment and agriculture ministries and is a global initiative of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO).
According to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, agriculture and climate change have a two-way relationship as agricultural activities contribute toward climate change through greenhouse gases and farming is invariably impacted by weather anomalies brought on by climate change.
The senior coordinator of the FAO-GEF, Jeffrey Griffin reportedly stated that the primary purpose of the program is to integrate agricultural policies and practices with environmental concerns. For the record, agricultural activities are known to emit three different greenhouse gases in copious amounts: CO2 from land cultivation, nitrous oxide from fertilizers, and methane through livestock that significantly contributes to climate change.
Reportedly, the overall cost of the project is estimated to be around $902 million (approximately INR 65,000 crore). The GEF would be granting $33.5 million towards the initiative while the remaining amount of $868 million would be obtained through a co-financing route, cite sources.
For the uninitiated, India is one of the leading member nations of GEF and strives to find solutions to some of the most daunting environmental issues affecting the globe, concerning climate change, biodiversity, land degradation, international waters and land degradation. Recently, the Indian government decided to boost its share of funding to the GEF by around 25%, cite trusted sources.