Talk on urban biodiversity

S Raghupathy, executive director, CII Godrej Green Business Centre, will hold a talk on how to attract biodiversity in urban spaces at Goethe-Zentrum programme hall on Tuesday at 6.30 pm.

Amongst the increasing anthropogenic activities, like farming, forestry and urbanisation, that have been observed to cause significant changes to the environments and resulting in habitat fragmentation and creation of modified land types, urbanisation is accelerating at an unprecedented rate. An estimated 45 per cent of the world’s population of almost seven billion living in cities, a percentage which is expected to rise significantly in the next few years. This increase in urbanisation is expected to have severe detrimental effects on biodiversity.

In line with the increasing importance being given worldwide to protection of the environment and biodiversity, CII – Godrej GBC, a centre of excellence for energy and environment, with extensive experience in the area of adaptation and mitigation of climate change is currently working on various initiatives of landscapes and biodiversity conservation. The activities include assessment of biodiversity index inline with Singapore Biodiversity Index study, documentation of native species of plants, rating the urban landscapes based on IGBC Green Landscape Rating System, study on attracting biodiversity in urban spaces and training the nurserymen in enhancing the plant business. Raghupathy’s talk will mainly focus on what CII – Godrej GBC will be doing towards this initiative.