New Delhi, (Samajweekly) The Deep Ocean Mission would not result in any over exploitation of the marine resources by the corporate houses and will not affect the life and livelihoods of fishers in the country, the Parliament was told on Wednesday.
The Deep Ocean Mission aims to explore deep oceanic resources and develop technologies for their sustainable use. The outcome of the programme is intended to identify potential new resources and develop technology for harnessing them in future, which may generate additional opportunities for livelihoods, Science and Technology and Earth Sciences Minister Dr Jitendra Singh told the Lok Sabha in a written reply.
“The Deep Ocean Mission is related to the Blue Economy. The activities of Deep Ocean Mission will help the components of blue economy such as fisheries, tourism and maritime transport, renewable energy, aquaculture, seabed extractive activities and marine biotechnology,” he said.
In the Budget 2022-23, the Ministry of Earth Sciences was allocated Rs 2,653.51 crore, which is in addition to over Rs 4,000 crore allocated earlier for the Deep Sea Mission.
India launched its prototype for first manned Ocean Mission ‘Samudrayaan’ at Chennai in October last year and thus joined the elite club of nations such as US, Russia, Japan, France, and China to have such underwater vehicles for carrying out subsea activities.
This niche technology shall facilitate the Earth Sciences Ministry in carrying out deep ocean exploration of the non-living resources such as polymetallic manganese nodules, gas hydrates, hydro-thermal sulphides, and cobalt crusts, located at a depth between 1,000 and 5,500 metres.
The government had approved the Deep Ocean Mission in June 2021 to be implemented by the Ministry at a total budget of Rs 4,077 crore for five years. This Mission is a multi-ministerial, multi-disciplinary programme with emphasis on development of deep-sea technology.
