Dears, If you feel strongly about the environment and about its continuous destruction in Goa, Please attend the meeting. You can also attend the Morpilla Bachav Samitee-GoaMAP meeting at Morpilla at 09.30 at Morpilla, the NISARG-CEE meeting at the Seminar Hall of NIO at Dona Paula from 09.30 A.M. or any other event. If you care for the environment, show your solidarity. Nuture a tree in your neighbourhood, even if it is a roadside tree planted by the Government agencies. One tree nurtured is better than ten tree seedlings planted. One man can organise for a billion trees to be planted. If you do not believe this, read what my class mate in Bangalore, now a District Collector/Magistrate, Mr. S.M. Raju, IAS, did in Bihar under NREGA. Mog asundi Miguel
--- On Fri, 4/6/10, GBA office <[email protected]> wrote: Goa Bachao Abhiyan www.savegoa.com [email protected]; Mbl.9767701245 4th June 2010 On World Environment Day, 05 June, 2010, a meeting has been called by GBA and like-minded groups and individuals at 4.30 pm at the Tristao Braganza-Cunha Memorial hall, near Azad Maidan, Panaji to chalk a plan of action to press for "Freeze on constructions in ecosensitive zones marked in draft RP2021" while the RP2021 gets ready. Despite several memorandums, meetings and protests the government has been dragging its feet on issuing appropriate orders. After the structured meeting with GBA and other groups the government has come out with four orders namely on flying squads, committee to examine constructions on ecosensitive zones of RP2001 marked as settlement and industrial zones, heritage zone protection committee[all notified in the Official Gazette of Goa dated 27 May, 2010]; and the fourth order on committee to review TCP Act, which is not notified but announced. The government has not yet issued any orders to freeze constructions on ecosensitive zones. The GBA strongly condemns the delaying tactics adopted by the Goa Government and the Goa Administration alike to frustrate the genuine demands of the citizens. The Government of Goa continues to drag its feet even on finalising the Regional Plan 2021, in spite of its pious assurances on 27 March, 2010 in the Goa Legislative Assembly to complete it in six months. Three months have passed and the Government has nothing to declare. Committees are being constituted to delay, not expedite, the matter as can be seen from the absence of any time line or plan of action for these committees. On World Environment Day stock of the damage to the environment will be done due to rampant hill cutting , landfilling, tree felling etc and the future course of agitation will be charted out to press for the demands. Dr Sabina Martins Convenor GBA -- Tel: +91-9767701245 Visit www.savegoa.com Meeting India's tree planting guru By Amarnath Tewary BBC News, Bihar Mr Raju is single-handedly organising the re-forestation of his state (All pics: Prashant Ravi) An Indian civil servant, SM Raju, has come up with a novel way of providing employment to millions of poor in the eastern state of Bihar. His campaign to encourage people to plant trees effectively addresses two burning issues of the world: global warming and shrinking job opportunities. Evidence of Mr Raju's success could clearly be seen on 30 August, when he organised 300,000 villagers from over 7,500 villages in northern Bihar to engage in a mass tree planting ceremony. In doing so the agriculture graduate from Bangalore has provided "sustainable employment" to people living below the poverty line in Bihar. 'Lack of awareness' Mr Raju has linked his "social forestry" programme to the central government's National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) which is also designed to provide employment to poor people. I told the villagers that they would get 100 days employment in a year simply by planting trees and protecting them SM Raju Under NREGA - initiated in February 2006 as the government's most ambitious employment generation scheme for poor people - the authorities are bound by law to provide a minimum of 100 days of employment a year to members of families living below the poverty line. About 44% of Bihar's population fall into this category. "The scheme has brought benefits to thousands of families since its implementation," said a recent International Labour Organisation report. But Mr Raju says that Bihar - being the poorest and most lawless state of India - has not been able to spend the allocated NREGA funds. "This is because of a lack of awareness among officials about the scheme," he said. The poor monsoon this year has led to lower agricultural outputs, while flash floods in some northern districts has made the situation even worse, he said. "So the idea struck to my mind, why not involve families below the poverty line in social forestry and give them employment under this scheme for 100 days? "Under the scheme, each family can earn a minimum of 10,200 rupees ($210)." Target The civil servant immediately made a blueprint of his idea and got the support of senior state officials. Villagers throughout the state have planted thousands of saplings In June Mr Raju released a comprehensive booklet of "dos and don'ts" and distributed it to village heads and district officials. His initiative meant that NREGA funds were fully utilised - in the past this has not always been the case. "I told the villagers that they would get 100 days employment in a year simply by planting trees and protecting them. The old, handicapped and widows would be given preference," he explained. Every village council has now been given a target of planting 50,000 saplings - a group of four families has to plant 200 seedlings and they must protect them for three years till the plants grow more sturdy. "They would get the full payment if they can ensure the survival of 90% of the plants under their care. For a 75-80% survival rate, they will be paid only half the wage. If the survival rate is less than 75%, the families in the group will be replaced," the guidelines say. Under NREGA rules, each worker has to be paid 100 rupees ($2) per day for 100 days in a year. Increase in funds Mr Raju even came close to planting one billion saplings on a single day. The scheme has become a huge success "I started preparing for this and motivating villagers by announcing the date as 30 August," he said. "The target for every village panchayat (council) was to plant 6,000 saplings from 6am to 6pm to achieve the target of one billion. At the end of the day, we found out that we were just just short of the target, but it was still a world record," the beaming civil servant said. Significantly, his scheme has even stopped the migration of poor labourers from the area in search of employment elsewhere during monsoon time. "We never thought we would get employment for planting trees and protecting them," said Paigambarpur village head Indra Bhusan, whose community - like many others - planted over 30,000 saplings mostly on both flanks of the 14km embankment which criss-crosses their village. The saplings planted are both fruit and non-fruit trees. The non-fruit seedlings have been planted on the banks of the embankment and on state and national highways - while fruit bearing trees are planted inside the villages. This year the central government has given more money to the scheme. Meanwhile, the Bihar civil servant is busy collecting the facts and figures to get his feat listed by Guinness World Records. "Bihar has edged out Pakistan from the record book," he said flashing a confident smile. "Its all become possible due to villagers. I owe them a lot." [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
