Int’l moot on environment begins at GCU

Lahore: A two-day international conference on “environment and sustainable development” Tuesday began at the Government College University, Lahore under the auspices of the university’s Sustainable Development Study Centre (SDSC) and Higher Education Commission (HEC). Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Muhammad Khaleeq-ur-Rahman chaired the inaugural session of the conference, while eminent Turkish environmentalist Dr Esra Yel, Punjab University GIS Director Prof Dr Sajid Rasheed and conference focal person Dr Amtul Bari Tabinda were also present.

In her opening remarks, Dr Tabinda said that sustainable development was a unique approach that integrated environment, economics and society in such a way that humans could fulfill their present needs without jeopardizing the needs of their future generations. He said that the SDSC conference on “environment and sustainable development” was aimed at establishing a thematic networking among researchers, environmentalists and policy makers, along with the reinforcement of collaboration between educational and industrial sector.

Speaking on the occasion, Vice Chancellor Prof Rahman hoped that the conference would bring to light the country’s environmental problems and their global diversification, along with the ways to solve these issues. He said environment was multi-disciplinary subject and a good environmentalist must be good chemist, good physicist and good botanist. He also called upon the conference’s organizing to publish proceedings of the conference as per the best international standards.

Presenting a case study on Lahore, Ismet Savuk, a solid waste management expert from Turkey, said Lahore was the most populated and most difficult city of Punjab province with regard to solid waste management. He laid a stress on social awareness and not even esthetically but also for physical participation in remediation and management of solid wastes.

About 200 research papers on the topics of ‘Climate Change’, ‘Solid Waste Management’, ‘Toxicology’ ‘Air Pollution’, ‘Alternative Energy’, ‘Environmental Management’, ‘Biodiversity and Ecology’, ‘Wastewater Management’, ‘Environmental Microbiology’, and ‘Geographical Information System’ will be presented at the six technical sessions of the conference. About five foreign experts from Turkey were participating in the international conference.