New Delhi, Oct 05 (KNS): The World Sustainable Development Summit (WSDS) 2016 began in Delhi on Wednesday with "Beyond 2015: People, Planet & Progress" as its theme.

President Pranab Mukherjee will inaugurate the WSDS tomorrow at Vigyan Bhawan, which brings together leaders from government, industry and civil society to find solutions to global challenges related to sustainability.

The event comes on the heels of India ratifying the Paris climate agreement on October 2, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.

Power minister Piyush Goyal, HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar, Environment Minister Anil Madhav Dave, Minister of State for Aviation Jayant Sinha, Ambassador of the European Union to India Tomasz Kozlowski will take part in the event.

At the thematic session today on "climate resilient on agriculture" at the World Sustainable Development Summit organised by The Energy and Research Institute (TERI), speakers called for a robust assessment on climate change projects and research for climate resilient crops.

Pramod Agarwal, regional programme leader of Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAF) deliberated on synergies and tradeoffs between food security and adaptations. "Achieving sustainable food security in a world with a growing population, changing diets and a changing climate is a major challenge", he said.

Agarwal pitched for research and innovation for developing drought and flood tolerate crops. "Numerous researches are underway but we have to go a long way to achieve the desired results for a sustainable agriculture development", he said.

The session dealt elaborately on climate-related crop failures, fishery collapses and livestock deaths, which have caused economic losses and undermine food security, which are likely to become more severe as global warming continues.

Agarwal also spoke on the context of climate variability and uncertainty about future climate conditions. "Agriculture farms are subject to increasing climate variability and extremes, we need to have a robust assessment of climate change projects of impact assessment at regional and local level", he stated.

When asked on economic and sustainable variety of crops for boosting agriculture in North East India, Agarwal said, "Research and innovation should be taken up to accelerate step for more adaptive varieties".

David Butler, Director of Sustainable Food Systems Ireland talked brand "Origin Green", a food marketing board based on producing safe, sustainable and secure food that is traceable all the way back to farmers.

He said, "Every animal in Ireland has a carbon navigator, which measures the carbon footprint of the food being produced. As the only country with such a system, customers can calculate carbon dioxide emissions from the milk or meat they consume". He said that from an environmental point of view, Ireland has the most efficient and transparent system in the world, referring to the country's sustainable food production and management.

Butler mooted that such a system can be replicated in other parts of the country for effective sustainable agriculture development practices.

At the summit's inaugural session today, Randal Newton, Vice President, Engineering Operations of Ingersoll Rand said, "Technology breakthroughs in refrigerants and better control and maintenance of systems are providing the foundation for a significant reduction in lifecycle emissions in buildings and in transport refrigeration. Ingersoll Rand supports the HFC amendment to the Montreal Protocol in 2016 as one of the key initiatives to reduce the greenhouse effect on our environment."

"With India formally joining the Paris Agreement, we are confident that the search for solutions would continue further with more R&D activities and industry-led innovations in search for low-GWP HFC alternatives," he added.

The panel also explored how the Montreal Protocol can provide funding support for transitions offering greater efficiency and for next generation, low global warming potential (GWP) solutions for room air conditioning systems. (KNS)