The Hyderabad biodiversity pledge is of “paramount importance” of protecting resources and biological diversity

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It indicates India’s commitment to the protection of biodiversity

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made a Hyderabad Pledge on Tuesday, under which India will spend $50 million to strengthen the institutional mechanisms for protection of biological diversity during its two-year presidency of the Convention on Biological Diversity.

This will be used to advance the objectives of the CBD, at the national and state level in the country. Similar capacity building assistance funding will be made available to developing countries. […]

Protecting and promoting biodiversity has always been an integral part of the Indian ethos and culture. This can be seen from the thousands of sacred groves all over the country. Traditional system of agriculture and medicine in India has depended on plant and animal biodiversity, and protecting the wild relatives of these resources that we use today is of paramount importance.

Since it has been a matter of concern that the public knowledge represented by biodiversity may be restricted in the regime of modern intellectual property rights, India has created a digital library of traditional knowledge. This is in a format that is easily accessible to patent examiners and had been able to avert over a thousand cases of bio-piracy. Also, 105 claims were cancelled or dropped by Patent Offices. India was offering its assistance to the World Intellectual Property Organisation to set up other similar facilities.

The treasure trove of traditional knowledge should be used for the benefit of all humanity, rather than for profit, he said. […]

The Executive Secretary of the CBD, Braulio Ferreira de Souza Dias praised India’s Hyderabad Pledge and said it showed its commitment to the objective of protection of biodiversity. […]

Source: The Hindu : News / National : Manmohan pledges $50 million to protect bio-diversity, 16 October 2012
Address : https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/manmohan-pledges-50-million-to-protect-biodiversity/article4002625.ece?homepage=true
Date Visited: 4 March 2021

[Bold typeface added above for emphasis]

Research the above issues with the help of Shodhganga: A reservoir of theses from universities all over India, made available under Open Access >>

Learn from M S Swaminathan – a world renowned scientist – how biological diversity contributes to public health, people’s livelihood and environmental security in addition to food security: his call on fellow citizens to use and share resources in a more sustainable and equitable manner; outlining the long journey from the 1992 Earth Summit to a commitment to foster inherited knowledge through India’s Biodiversity Act and Genome Saviour Award; an award intended to reward those who are “primary conservers” – guardians of biological diversity!

More about the work of his foundation which “aims to accelerate use of modern science and technology for agricultural and rural development to improve lives and livelihoods of communities.” – www.mssrf.org | Regarding the issues of food security raised above, and the nutritional value of indigenous grains, seeds and millets, read an in-depth report that concludes that “the tribal food basket has always been ­diverse and nutritious” >>

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Search tips: in the search field seen below, combine the name of any particular state, language or region with that of any tribal (Adivasi) community; add keywords of special interest (health, nutrition endangered language, illegal mining, sacred grove); learn about the rights of Scheduled Tribes such as the Forest Rights Act (FRA); and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, women’s rights, and children’s right to education; specify any other issue or news item you want to learn more about (biodiversity, climate change, ecology, economic development, ethnobotany, ethnomedicine, global warming, effective measures to prevent rural poverty, bonded labour, and human trafficking).

For a list of websites included in a single search, click here. To search Indian periodicals, magazines, web portals and other sources safely, click here. To find an Indian PhD thesis on a particular tribal community, region and related issues, click here >>

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Learn more about water-related issues that affect India’s tribal communities >>
“National development and the development of tribal communities are linked to each other.” – Droupadi Murmu | Speeches by the 15th President of India >>

“Together, we must endeavour to strengthen tribal communities which are the role model in preservation of water, forest and land, and learn from their connection with nature and the surrounding environment for the sake of the entire human race.” – journalist and tribal rights activist Dayamani Barla in The Wire >>

Dr. Rashneh Pardiwala © Alexis Agliano Sanborn/Asia Society >>

“The recent trend is to use exotic species for manicured lawns and gardens. This means indigenous species are losing even more space, and our local species decline with them. New lifestyle patterns are also changing things. For example, India’s urban sparrow population has dipped. Even growing up, sparrows were as common as a crow or a pigeon. But now they’ve almost disappeared. Why? For one thing, our architecture is changing, and building facades no longer offer nesting sites. Even the old grain shops, which used to have grain strewn in the road, have turned into packaged super markets. Suddenly, you have an entire species disappearing because you’ve taken away its food source, habitat, and flight path.” – Rashneh Pardiwala, Centre for Environmental Research and Education (CERE) in Mumbai (Asia Blog, 27 July 2015)

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