The process of granting environmental clearances will become even faster as the government intends to reduce the average number of days for clearance from 108 to 70-80 days, said Prakash Javadekar, Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change.

Speaking at the three-day ‘Annual Conference on Chemical and Disaster Management (CIDM) 2019 – Industrial Safety and Emergency Preparedness’ organized by FICCI, jointly with the MoEF&CC, Javadekar said that the government has already eased the process of environment clearance from 640 days earlier to 108 days now. Further, he assured to bring down the time for giving permissions and approvals to 70-80 days.

"Unless we implement what we have decided, we can’t achieve our goals. Countries such as US and UK implement the laws ruthlessly. We have decided to give importance to the implementation aspect of the industry, and we want to see the disaster management preparedness of the industries," he said.

Ratan P Watal, Member Secretary of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister and Principal Adviser, NITI Aayog, Government of India said, "Since 1984 till today, the number of industries that have grown exponentially and therefore the risk connected with the industries has also gone up. Though the regulations have also kept up pace, but if you’re able to achieve $5 trillion economy, we have to be aware that there can be industrial disasters that need to be controlled or mitigated."

"The ambitious target of making India a $5 trillion economy cannot be achieved without significant investment in the growth of chemical and industrial activities in the country. And if the economy has to be sustainable, the growth in chemical and industrial sector needs to be matched with growth in resilience to industrial disasters," said Kamal Kishore, Member, National Disaster Management Authority, Government of India. A greater involvement of volunteer groups and NGOs can help create awareness, he added.

L Mansingh, IAS (Retd), Former Secretary, Government of India said that experience sharing, and networking is important for disaster management and preparedness.

Lt Gen (Dr) J R Bhardwaj, Chairman, CIDM highlighted the success of the conference in creating awareness and training of the delegates from the chemical industry.

This was the 34th conference organized by FICCI in partnership with NDMA and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and Government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi.

By EP News Bureau

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