Lucknow, Jan 13 (IANS): Gram Panchayats in Uttar Pradesh will now address issues related to climate change at the local level by turning into 'climate smart gram panchayats'.

Plans have been made for 39 gram panchayats in 39 districts, mainly those that are highly vulnerable to climate change.

With this, Uttar Pradesh has become the first state to initiate local level climate action. The initiative is in line with the state's goal to adopt a bottom-up approach for localisation of climate action at the gram panchayat level.

The department of environment, forest and climate change has launched the plan development process with a detailed stakeholder consultation.

Ashish Tiwari, secretary, environment, forest and climate change said that the plans will be implemented not only through the convergence of central and state schemes but also through private involvement and CSR partners in the form of Panchayat Private Partnerships (PPP).