AMRAIZ KHAN
The two-day international workshop on Climate Change started at the Lahore College for Women University on Friday with a statement that investigating the effects of climate change on water resources is crucial to inquire and deeply understand the effects on aquatic animal, and plant communities and their habitat and also its consequences on the human environment.
The collaboration of various women’s universities in Pakistan including Lahore College for Women University (LCWU), Fatima Jinnah Women University (FJWU) and SBK Women University (SBKWU) in partnership with North Carolina State University aims to develop Pakistan Women University Climate Change Consortium (PWUCC). This will provide a platform for young women environmentalists to work collectively for the creation of more complex and intricate structures, opening up new possibilities for the design of advanced procedures and devices, that can mitigate Climate change effects on water resources.
This two-day International Workshop on “Climate Change Impacts on Glaciers, Rivers and The Ocean” was organized by the Department of Environmental Science, Lahore College for Women University in collaboration with North Carolina State University, USA. The conference was funded by the Punjab Higher Education Commission.
The objective of the international workshop was to provide a platform for female environmentalists to understand the climate change issues and challenges faced by North Carolina State and Pakistan.
Speaking at the inaugural session, the Vice-chancellor, Prof. Dr. Bushra Mirza said that environmental science is a critical field of study that calls for the use of knowledge and public-private partnerships to work for the restoration of natural ecosystems and the attainment of sustainable development goals. She stated that the world is facing global climate change impacts particularly the developing countries thus the importance of environmental science cannot be overstated and this type of international collaboration in this field can play a crucial role in mitigating the impacts and finding more sustainable and rational solutions.
Secretary Environment protection department Punjab Dr Sajid Mahmood Chauhan said we are among the top 10 polluted nations. Still, for the past 5 years, Pakistan has been trying to recover from environmental degradation.
In order to protect the environment of Punjab we divided it into 3 parts, 1st part includes rules and regulations, 2nd part is equipment and monitoring sector and the last part is strategies to control pollution.
On 29 March 2023, we were able to approve our clean air policy and plastic management policy for the first time in Punjab.
At the end of his speech, he said, we are ready to cooperate with academia for a better environment in Punjab.
Prof Dr Lewis Owen, Head of the Department of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, North Carolina State University USA, in his remarks, stated that understanding the nature and dynamics of Quaternary paleoenvironmental change and landscape evolution of environmental geology and natural hazards along active plate margins is crucial in the Himalayan-Tibetan Orogen and the Western Cordilleras of North and South America. He mentioned some of the best laboratories working for understanding the dynamics of geomorphic, tectonic and climatic processes, and ultimately providing the analogues for understanding the evolution of many ancient plate boundaries. He added that applying remote sensing, field methods and geochronology in various geographical regions would provide the basis for advanced climate change research.
