Today, Hon’ble President of India, Sh. Pranab Mukherjee inaugurated the ‘World Conference on Environment’ organized by the National Green Tribunal in New Delhi.
Speaking on the occasion, the President welcomed the fact that conservation has now become inclusive and participatory. This shift has strengthened over a period of time due to sensitization of people in general and firm political will on part of governments all across. He quoted Mahatma Gandhi and said “Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need but not every man’s greed”.
The President said recent studies and systematic reviews indicate that environmental factors are responsible for an estimated 24% of the global burden of disease in terms of healthy life years lost and 23 % of all deaths. Children are the worst sufferers of the adverse impact of environmental diseases. 24% of all deaths under the age of 15 are due to diarrhoea, malaria and respiratory diseases – all of which are environment related. 19% of the deaths caused by Cancer worldwide are attributed to carcinogens that unmindful industrialization produces. It is high time that we ask ourselves the questions- to what extent can we allow environmental degradation? What are we going to leave behind for our future generations? What steps need to be taken to curb this peril of environmental degradation?
