CB BureauA tri-party memorandum of understanding (MoU) has been signed by HCL Foundation, the district administration of Gautam Buddh Nagar, and Greater Noida Authority for implementing mass afforestation and rainwater harvesting to combat climate change.
Nidhi Pundhir, director – HCL Foundation, Samakant Srivastava, GM, Projects, GNIDA, and Sanjay Mishra, SDM, Sadar, Gautam Buddh Nagar District signed the MoU in the presence of BN Singh, DM, Gautam Buddh Nagar, and Narendra Bhooshan, IAS, chief executive officer, GNIDA.
Responding to a CauseBecause query, the HCL Foundation spokesperson informs that the MoU will be for a duration of 10 years starting from 16 December 2019. Mass afforestation is planned on the land assigned near Eastern Peripheral (village Maincha) measuring 27.29 acres. The project aims to contribute to SDGs 15 (Life on Land) and 13 (Climate Action).
The Foundation explains that mass afforestation can help in sequestering a large amount of carbon from the atmosphere since trees are one of the major carbon sinks and can thus mitigate the impact of climate change in the long run. Other benefits from this initiative will be increase in green cover and biodiversity, decrease in pollution, increase in trees outside forest (TOF), and contribution towards India’s commitment to increase 5 mn ha additional land, in line with its Paris Agreement commitments.
The role of HCL Foundation will be to implement the project through partner organisations who will carry out afforestation and maintenance of native species of trees and plants suitable to the soil and environmental conditions. The Foundation will have no legal ownership of the assigned land and will utilise it only for mass afforestation/environment conservation. It will also provide support to the afforestation activities under the HCL Uday Programme in tandem with the on-going afforestation schemes of the Forest Department.