- Prof Narendra Kumar Choudhary, Global Forum For Disaster Management; Dr PJ Philip, National Institute of Technology; Prof Kalpana Chaudhari, SAKP Polytechnic
The Urban population of developing countries is predicted to rise from one third in 1990 to over 50% by 2025. In 1950 the world’s total urban population was 734 million, 448 million of whom were living in developed countries and the remaining 286 were in developing regions. By 1980, the world’s total urban population had increased to 1.8 billion the majority of whom, 958 million, were living in developing countries. On the basis of these figures and other global trends, it would appear that Africa and Asia will have the highest share of the world’s urban growth in the next 25 years, resulting in the considerable rise of large numbers of metropolitan cities. The next generations increase in population, production and poverty will cause the social, economic and environmental problems in waste management in these cities. The electronic governance will play an important role in the management of the various services in these cities. In India, the number of cities with populations of more than 100,000 were 300 in the year 1990, which was subsequently increased to 393 in the year 2000. The number of million plus towns also increased from 3 to 10 in last the 20 years.
The developing countries are following the same trend. These cities and towns are now facing the acute solid waste (from public toilet) problems causing environmental pollution. The combined effect of this pollution is degradation in the soil, water and air quality, which ultimately affects the civic health in these areas. The farmers from the peri-urban areas are bringing their agricultural products including vegetables to the city market. This creates large amounts of solid waste from vegetables as well as animal excreta, especially organic waste, which contains a higher percentage of moisture content. The economic instruments for reduction of solid waste cannot be successfully implemented without pre-existing appropriate standards and effective monitoring and enforcement capacities.
Although economic incentives have been viewed as an alternative to the traditional approach, they cannot be considered as short cuts to the urban solid waste management problem. The management of information systems (MIS) using electronic governance on source reduction, source separation and producer responsibility, these three factors are critical in developing and designing an ecological sanitation model for economic and optimum waste management model using composting systems in towns of the Maharashtra. The municipal councils and local authorities are spending large amounts of their budget on solid waste management systems, which is a major constraint in expanding other civic services to citizens. The e-governance and e-commerce is an efficient tool for the municipal waste management system.
This presentation deals with the present scenario on application of electronic governance and e-commerce for urban environmental management through composting using the organic waste in cities and towns such as solid waste, night soil, animal excreta etc. and its application in agriculture and forestry, past efforts to ensure the economic development of compost processes from agriculture waste, kitchen waste, market waste and organic waste for environmental and ecological sustainability. It also discusses some of the recent successful examples in regards to application of electronic governance and e-commerce using public - private and people’s partnership in infrastructure provisions for bio-treatment and marketing for the same. The presentation emphasizes the extensive capacity building for electronic governance and e-commerce for ecological management using compost processes and its application for sustainability at a local level for the economic use of organic waste.
BIOS:
Prof Narendra Kumar Choudhary has 47 years of academic and professional experience in engineering and technology education. He served the Technical Education Department, Maharashtra State from 1963 to 1996, during which time he held the posts of Lecturer, Head of the Department and Principal in Engineering Polytechnics. From 1990 he occupied administrative posts managing Technical Education, first as Deputy Director, at regional level and later from 1994 as Joint Director of Technical Education at state level. Prof Choudhary has had a meritorious academic career. He earned the Diploma in Civil Engineering, standing second in order of merit and the degree of Bachelor of Civil Engineering (B.E.), standing first in order of merit, both from Nagpur University. He acquired the degree of Master of Engineering (M.E. Structural Engineering) with Distinction, in 1976, from Shivaji University, Kolhapur. His affiliations extend to the Institution of Engineers (India) as a Life Fellow (FIE), Indian Society for Technical education (ISTE) as its Life Member and International Commission on Groundwater-Seawater Interaction (CGSI). At present he is Secretary General of the Global Forum For Disaster Management, GFDM, ISDR, India from 01 December, 2005 and responsible for planning and implementation of the international projects, such as Global environmental changes, coastal zone management and disaster management, application of ICTs, socio-economic development of urban/rural areas and capacity building through institutional networking and implementation of programs for achievement of United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals (UNMDG). He has participated in the conference on Managing Global Environmental Changes - Regional Challenges during the Earth Science System Partnership (ESSP) Open Science Conference (OSC), at Beijing, China in November 2006 and presented the paper on coastal disasters and its management. In collaboration with the Open University Geological Society Mainland Europe, UK and Switzerland (OUGS), he has organized several workshops on global climate changes, coastal zone management, disaster management etc. in India, China and Switzerland. He has organized sessions on coastal zone management and disaster management in Europe and American region. In collaboration with National Institute of Technology, Kurukshetra, India (NITK) and OUGS, Switzerland and other international organizations in EU region he has organized and coordinated an international training program for sustainable development and management for post graduate students of NITK in 2007, providing coveted exposure to international trends in sustainable development, UN-MDGs, United Nation’s missions and training centers in Europe especially in Switzerland, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium and France.
Dr P J Philip is working as Professor in the Department of Humanities and Social science at National Institute of Technology, Kurukshetra, India. He has a multi-disciplinary academic background with qualifications in humanities and Social science, Management and Law (MA, MBA, LLB, PhD). He is presently the Head of the Department of Humanities & Social Sciences and the Department of Business Administration. Dr Philip has developed expertise in the area of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) as well. He is a Coordinator of the IPR Cell of the National Institute and has undertaken two sponsored projects of the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Govt. of India. He was also involved in drafting an IPR Policy for the National Institute and has organized a number of workshops, seminars, and conferences on IPR. He has published about thirty papers in journals and conference proceedings on the socio-economic development, industrial labors issues, poverty alleviations and self employment problems, application of technology for social and economic upliftment of the communities and other allied subjects such as management of Information systems, e-governance, e-commerce etc. He has organized sixteen workshop/seminars and attended about fifty conferences, including one in Europe.
Mrs Kalpana Chaudhary is working with the Institute for Sustainable development and research, India. She has passed the University Degree in Electronics Engineering. She has obtained the Post Graduate Diploma in Urban Housing and Real Estate Management with specialization in Electronics governance and e-commerce from Institute for Housing and Urban development studies (I.H.S.), Rotterdam, The Netherlands. She is working on the project on application of e-governance for rural development. She has participated in the World water Forum at The Hague, The Netherlands. She has also participated in the 4th World Fishery Congress and participated in the international workshop on Management of Information System for fishery sector at British Columbia University, Vancouver, Canada.