‘Empower women to sustain resources’

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New Delhi, May 21: With the burden of environmental degradation being largely borne by the women living within and in the periphery of forests, the government has come out with a proposal to empower women to ensure sustenance of natural resources.

“It is essential that women play a greater role in the management of natural resources,” official sources said quoting the national environment policy (NEP), which was recently approved by the Union Cabinet.

They (women) have to bear the burden of natural resources degradation and also have little control over the management of these resources, the sources said.

The principal and direct cause of deforestation has been cultivation, settlement, infrastructure and industry, they said.

Forests provide multiple environmental benefits including recharging of mountain aquifers, which sustain rivers in the country. They also conserve soil and prevent floods and drought. They provide habitat for wildlife and the ecological conditions for maintenance and natural evolution of genetic diversity of flora and fauna, they said.

Woods yield timber, fuel wood, and other forest produce and possess immense potential for economic benefits, in particular for local communities, the sources said. “National environment policy seeks an important role for women in the management to extend the forest coverage and fill the gaps that exists,” the sources said.

The policy talks of incorporating relevant provisions of the national policy for the empowerment of women, which provides a framework for addition of elements towards protection of natural resources through women empowerment, sources said.