NMCG Hosts Virtual Session On First Day Of The Stockholm World Water Week 2022

New Delhi, August 25 (TNA) National Mission for Clean Ganga organized a virtual session on the first day of the Stockholm World Water Week 2022 (August 24-September 01) on Wednesday. The keynote address was given by G. Asok Kumar, Director General, National Mission for Clean Ganga on ‘Arth Ganga: Model for Economic River-People Connect for Sustainable River Rejuvenation using Economic Bridge’.

Kumar gave a detailed presentation on Arth Ganga elaborating the Model and the interventions made so far. “Arth Ganga has ushered-in a paradigm shift in the River Basin Management,” Kumar said while highlighting the significance of Arth Ganga.

Elaborating on the six verticals of Arth Ganga, he said that the most important aspect is Zero Budget Natural Farming that envisages chemical-free farming for 10 kms on either side of the river, generating “more income, per drop”, and ‘Gobar Dhan’ for farmers.

“We are planning to promote natural farming in a big way and will be conducting ‘shibirs’ on natural farming in Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh in the coming days to nudge the farmers towards natural farming,” he added, while informing about the recent event in Shirdi, Maharashtra where 30 farmers were facilitated by NMCG to attend the 5-day Subhash Palekar Natural Farming workshop.

He said that collaborations with various ministries and organisations are being made for monetization and reuse of sludge & wastewater that envisages reuse of treated water for irrigation, industrial purposes and revenue generation for ULBs. He cited the example of arrangement with Indian Oil Corporation for selling of treated water from Mathura refinery.

“Livelihood Generation Opportunities such as ‘Ghat Mein Haat’, promotion of local products, Ayurveda, medicinal plants, capacity building of volunteers like Ganga Praharis is also being done under Arth Ganga,” he said, adding, “NMCG plans to launch 75 Jalaj Kendras across the Ganga basin to create livelihood opportunities for the local people, out of which 26 were launched on 16th August.”

T. Vijay Kumar, in his address, spoke about the key steps fundamental to assure cooling of the planet Earth. He mentioned that adopting sustainable practices like Natural Farming and ensuring the maximum possible conservation of water could bring a bright future to the country.

He gave a presentation showing the scaling lessons from the experience of the state of Andhra Pradesh wherein the farmers achieved excellent results after their transition from the practice of traditional farming to Natural Farming. He added that the ‘Principles are common, but Practices are unique to a region’, and that India has got a special advantage on account of Natural Farming.