Kohima: The second National Conference on recent trends in Plant Diversity and Conservation Strategies organised by the Department of Botany, Nagaland University, in collaboration with East Himalayan Society for Spermatophyte Taxonomy (EHSST), North Bengal University, Siliguri is underway at the Nagaland University main campus at Lumami.
The inaugural function was graced by Deo Nukhu, Advisor, Science and Technology, Art and Culture and New and Renewable Energy as chief guest on Saturday
He stressed on the need for conservation of plants for a balanced ecological system and lamented that despite being blessed with rich diversified flora and fauna, Naga people still remain ignorant and neglectful when it comes to matters of preservation.
Highlighting a survey on Hunting conducted in 2008 on 66 villages in Nagaland, Mr Nukhu revealed that 928 persons were involved in hunting and of those 6 were habitual hunters.
The survey was taken from a total household of 14, 578 families. As per estimate, these hunters had killed around 14,936 wild cats, 9698 large animals, 47,495 small animals and 3, 26,214 birds in total (both large birds and small birds).
“It is distressing that lack of awareness among the rural mass endangers the ecological system,” he lamented.
He, however, lauded the resolution of NBCC council not to serve wild life meat in church related functions as a step to contribute to the conservation strategies.
Challenging the intellectuals and scholars to conduct more programmes and public awareness for meaningful co-existence of plants and animals to maintain ecological balance.
Mr Nukhu also impressed on the need for documentation of traditional ecological knowledge without which, he felt, Nagaland will lose the essence of rich diversity in flora and fauna.
Prof A K Bhatnagar recommended that the state government should reserve some rights for the botanist in the existing National parks to encourage researchers and to provide more access to nature related studies.
On this, he reminded that it is a challenge to research and document bio-diversity because it is a massive spectrum and the researchers involved are less.
The National Conference is being attended by delegates from across the country also including international delegates from Bhutan and Nepal.
The delegates in attendance are from Kalyani University, West Bengal, Delhi University, North Bengal University, Dr BAM Aurangabad University, Burduran University, Tripura University, Botanical Survey of India (BSI) Kolkata, and NBRI Lucknow.
The first National Conference on recent trend in Plants Diversity Studies and Conservation Strategies was held in 2010. (UNI)