PremiumEnvironment Minister Prakash Javadekar on Monday said from 2021, 10 best National Parks, five coastal and marine parks and the top five zoos in the country will be ranked and awarded every year.
At present, India has a network of 903 protected areas covering about 5% of the total geographic area of the country.
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The minister while releasing Management Effectiveness Evaluation (MEE) of 146 National Park and Wildlife Sanctuaries in the Country also said, "70% of the global tiger population, 70% of Asiatic lions and more than 60% of leopards population in India is a certificate of India's thriving biodiversity. India has achieved what other countries could not."
MEE of protected areas has emerged as a key tool for the governments and international bodies to understand the strengths and weaknesses of the protected area management systems. The results of the present assessment are encouraging with an overall mean MEE score of 62.01% which is higher than the global mean of 56%.
With this round of evaluation, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change successfully completed one full cycle of evaluating all terrestrial National Parks and Wildlife Sanctuaries of the country from 2006 to 2019.
MEE is a very important document that provides valuable guidance on various aspects of wildlife and protected area expand MEE of Marine Protected Areas.
The Environment Minister also launched the Management Effectiveness Evaluation of Indian zoos framework which proposes guidelines, criteria and indicators for the evaluation of zoos of the country.
The assessment criteria and indicators look beyond the traditional concepts, include issues of animal welfare, husbandry and sustainability of resources and finance. The exercise is moving towards developing the highest standards in zoos across India and adhering to core values of accountability, transparency, innovation, use of technology, collaboration and integrity to achieve the mandate of conservation of endangered species.
