Strong Social Media Activism, Mobilisation Required To Flag Environmental Conservation: Speakers

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 5th Jun, 2022 ) :The Speakers at a webinar on Sunday said there was ardent need to highlight environmental conservation and protection through social media to mobilise the masses for taking care of the mother nature facing huge pressures due to massive anthropogenic activities.

The webinar on World Environment Day (WED 2022) titled on this year's theme "#OnlyOneEarth" was jointly organised by the Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency (Pak-EPA) and Anthro Insights. The session was moderated by Syed Mujtaba whereas DG Pak-EPA Farzana Altaf Shah delivered the welcome remarks. DG EPA Farzana Altaf Shah in her welcome remarks said there was need for great contribution and activism for environmental conservation through social media as there was dearth of content based nature protection. She said, "5th June is our environmental pledge year to revive our commitment to protect the mother nature every year". She added that as for mother's there was no dedicated day similar every day was an environmental day that demanded unwavering commitment and resolve of each individual to protect environment. The country, she said was facing extreme weather events and natural calamities as from ravaging forest fires to scorching droughts and damaging glacial melts there were numerous environmental hazards taking place from the North to the South. "The recent forest fires in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and Balochistan have incurred huge damages which demand scientific audit to ascertain the true cause of fires as most of them were man-made", she noted. She said the universe was returning us the heat cloud back in the form of rising temperature. "We need to start media activism on environmental conservation on social media portals. We need to arrange more webinars on water conservation and forest fire prevention", she suggested. Civic Engagement Expert Zafarullah Khan said, "Today's webinar has helped us reduce our carbon footprint and save fuel and energy through virtual engagement which is propitious and pertinent to WED 2022". "If we are not going to change our habits then nature has its own pattern to respond to the damages incurred on it by human activities", he added. The planet earth has its own capacity of carrying seven billion population if it's overstretched then it would result into natural catastrophe, Khan said. Development pattern needs a balance, he said, adding, "Holy Prophet (PBUH) once said if your cities exceed from a certain limit then develop more cities which is a prudent suggestion".

He added that the society in Pakistan generally believed in horizontal expansion which put direct pressure on natural resources. "As a nation we are less careful about managing safety and security in vertical and high rise infrastructures. Like the fire incidents in Lahore and Karachi underline the incompetence of authorities to handle the risk", he added. He suggested that there was need to wisely devise long term policies for proper transport system and others civic facilities to avoid massive natural disasters. "We need to teach out future generations for conservation otherwise we will be known as a reckless generation," he said. Head of Department of Environmental Sciences at the Islamic International University Dr Muhammad Irfan Khan said the WED 2022 theme recognized that humans needed to live in harmony with nature. He underscored that environmental security was an important aspect specifically water, food and energy security for making strong and long term national policies. "There is no doubt that the traditional security is important but Pakistan is among the top ten countries affected due to climate change and it needed to broaden it's horizon in terms of National Security and foreign policies. "We need to broaden our foreign policy horizon to include climate diplomacy and energy diplomacy, environmental diplomacy. There is an intrinsic relation between traditional and environmental security", he added. Dr Khan said there were obvious climate change impacts ranging from weather pattern change resulting hydrological change and change in water resources availability that all needed serious attention of the quarters concerned and an adequate public response to protect nature. Environmental Journalist Ali Jabir said public awareness and sensitisation was a must to be developed at the grass roots level for driving an effective mass mobilisation campaign on environmental conservation. He added that activism and awareness efforts in silos or specific social cohorts would not yield convincing results rather a holistic national efforts could help spearheading nature conservation and protection. He also suggested the quarters concerned to develop a academia, civil society, industry, regulatory body and experts nexus to implement best practices in the industrial sector that was mostly pollution the land, air and water resources. "The academia will help industrialists to get additional income generating products through protection, recycling and reusing methods in their production units," he added.