At Islamabad Zoo: Rs100m allocated for setting up wildlife conservation centre

ISLAMABAD: The federal government has allocated Rs 100 million under Public Service Development Programme (PSDP) for Climate Change Division’ new scheme in the fiscal year 2022-23 to establish a wildlife conservation and information centre at the old Islamabad Zoo. The allocated amount of millions of rupees in the Fiscal Year 2022-23 focused on initiating development work on the only Zoo of the capital that went non-functional due to poor care and management of the wildlife.

The wildlife conservation centre as proposed by the ministry would be a modern facility having advanced technological solutions to impart wildlife information to its visitors.

The Ministry overall got the allocation of Rs9.6 billion for it’s new and ongoing projects that would focus on climate change adaptation and mitigation endeavours to purge the country from adverse impacts of environmental degradation and global warming.

According to a budgetary document, the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) Planned Activities for Fiscal Year 2022-23 in Climate Change Division focused on Disaster Risk Management, Early Warning Systems, Availability of clean drinking water in Pakistan, Transition towards environmentally resilient Pakistan through adaptation and mitigation targeting ecological initiatives consistent with the Pakistan’s nationally determined contributions (NDCs) objectives, Attaining Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) to generate eco-system services and provide additional support to mitigation of GHG in Pakistan, Promote eco-tourism and improve the carbon sinking capacity and to establish real time monitoring of ambient air quality through establishment of monitoring stations, in periodic manner, throughout Islamabad.

The amount of Rs 9.5 billion has been allocated for ongoing schemes while 100 million were earmarked for a new scheme in the PSDP 2022-23. The ongoing schemes include Capacity Building on Water Quality Monitoring and SDG 6 (6.1) Reporting at a cost of Rs 23 million; Climate Resilient Urban Human Settlements at Unit at an amount of Rs 19 million was earmarked. The maximum allocations were earmarked for Upscaling of Green Pakistan Programme (Revised) at a cost of Rs 9.4 billion.

An amount of Rs 100 million were allocated for the much awaited Islamabad Zoo project that would be transformed into a wildlife sanctuary and animal preserve zone. In the Sectoral Plan and Strategy 2022-23, the Annual Development Plan highlighted the Capacity Building on Water Quality Monitoring and SDG 6 (6.1) Reporting (USD 7.4 million), with an allocation of Rs 23 million in the PSDP 2022-23, aimed at maintaining water quality management labs (36 district labs in Punjab, 7 divisional labs in KP, One Lab in PCRWR at national level), capacity building for water policy and lab operations, knowledge and experiences sharing with Korean Government, strengthening coordination among Ministry of Climate Change and provincial governments.

The PSDP 2022-23 has earmarked Rs 9,450.582 million for “Ten Billion Trees Tsunami Programme-Phase-I Upscaling of Green Pakistan Programme (Revised)” for achieving the target of planting 500 million trees. The PSDP 2022-23 has earmarked Rs 563.035 million and Rs 1,245 million for installation of weather surveillance radars at Multan and Sukkur respectively.

While Pakistan Meteorological Department has developed project for “Establishment of new Meteorological Observatory at Naran and Hostel for Operational Staff at Balakot” which are estimated to cost of Rs 150 million.

The key interventions and programmes for 2022-23 underlined that the government of Pakistan would be allocating significant amount of funds to ensure efficient delivery of “Ten Billion Trees Tsunami Programme-Phase-I Upscaling of Green Pakistan Programme (Revised)” and set the target of 2000 million trees to achieve the targets under TBTTP in 2022-23.

It also focused on the establishment of 22 National Parks at an area of 223606.4 square kilometers throughout Pakistan, establishment of Air and Water Monitoring Network initially at Islamabad to be replicated throughout Pakistan, support KP Forest Department for sustainability of TBTTP, increase the pace of planning and implementation mechanism to make cities more climate resilient under Climate Resilient Urban Human Settlement Units Project and to establish Weather Surveillance Radar at Multan and Sukkur.