THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Shailesh Nayak, former secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences, on Thursday underlined the need for ensuring access to benefits of space technology to larger sections of society.
He was speaking after inaugurating the fifth convocation of the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology (IIST), ISRO’s academy at Valiyamala, Thiruvananthapuram, for shaping future space scientists. ‘’Space should be seen as a common resource of the entire humankind, which requires a balanced approach between social priorities and commercial interests,’’ Shailesh Nayak said.
He stressed the need for development of ‘decision support systems’ on natural resources and for the mitigation of natural calamities. Effective responses to global environmental change depend on the quality of knowledge, expertise of organisations that respond to such events and the level of awareness in the communities.
Hence, the building of effective resilience to climate change needs to be addressed in an integrated manner at the three levels of the systems - global or earth system, social and human, Nayak said.
In all, 245 students graduated at the ceremony. Of them, 151 were conferred the BTech degree, out of which 54 graduated in aerospace engineering, 62 in avionics and 35 in physical sciences. MTech degree was conferred on 83 students while PhD was conferred on 11 students.
ISRO chairman A S Kiran Kumar, IIST director V K Dadhwal, Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre director K Sivan spoke.