The Shimla Climate Meet focusing on Himalayan Towns in the Northwest will take place on March 19-21 at Shimla
Himalayan Towns in the Northwest: “Climate Change, Impacts, and Challenges´, with this theme, the Shimla Climate Meet will be taking place on March 19-21, 2024, at Shimla was shared in a press release by Tikender Singh Panwar. The SCM will be organized by Action Aid India and “Simla Collective”, an open group comprising different sections of the society in the town with ecological and environmental concerns and bonds.
The Shimla Climate Meet (SCM) is being organized in the background of the incessant disasters taking place in the Himalayan region, particularly the concerns raised after the recent flooding in the state of Himachal Pradesh.
The SCM is not limited to Shimla town, rather the delegates representing the different social, environmental, and peoples’ movements, and other groups and experts in the field of science, environment, building, architects and planners, pastoralists, and so on will assemble. The northwestern states/union territories, comprising Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh, and Uttarakhand will participate in this meeting.
Why this meeting?
The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) VI report has categorically pointed out that the two most vulnerable zones in the Indian subcontinent are: Coastal Indian and the Himalayan Region. The Indian Himalayan Region (IHR) comprises 11 states and two union territories. The IPCC report states that in the years to come because of climate change owing to anthropogenic reasons, there is going to be massive change in weather patterns: less snow, more rainfall in shorter periods; frequency of extreme weather events will increase phenomenally high and the worst forms of disasters experienced in the history of once in a century shall be dozens and scores in the given period. We have all witnessed that in the last few years.
The SCM will specifically deal with challenges in the North Western region owing to climate change and its impact on vulnerable communities and groups. Farmers, marginalized workers, and informal sector workers are some of the worst affected people due to climate change. Pastoralists and wool. production is another area; likewise, dairy and animal husbandry is another important sector.
Specific demands and issues will be raised in a collaborative effort in which experts and different communities will talk to each other and create a framework for policy shifts required to adapt to climate change. What is important in this region is that the adaptive measures are strengthened so that minimum loss takes place to the lives and livelihoods, socio-cultural systems, and the geographies they inhabit.
Towns in the Himalayan Region pose major risks as the planning process needs to be revisited. The building typologies, land use change, all of that need to be discussed. Separate sessions will be held to create mountain typologies discourse in the policy framework.
The meeting will also discuss the lessons to be learned from the disasters in the Himalayan Region-DRR measures and mitigation and adaptive strategies.
The Campaign.
Simla Collective will launch a series of campaigns as a build-up to the meet to inform and involve our Shimla community and aid in a wide, participatory response. The Simla Collective will launch this campaign through street plays, the first one being held at Naaz on February 22, 2024, followed by many such performances in the town. There shall be various dissemination campaigns including reaching out to school and college students and engaging them in healthy discussions about their understanding and ambition of climate change and how they look at their futures in the given challenges. There shall be competitions on poster making, slogan creating, and other innovative ideas, both physical and online.
