Environment & People| August 2020

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Editorial

Advisors Narne Prabhakar Kaza Krishna Rao Dr. N. Harinath Dr. V. Haraprasad Advisory Board M. Gopala Krishna, IAS (Retd.)

C.S. Ramalakshmi, I.F.S, Dr. N. Bhaskara Rao Prof. P.G. Sastry Er. G. Prabhakar Prof. D.N. Reddy

COVID, COAL AND CLIMATE CHANGE very year on 9th August, we celebrate International Day of the World’s Indigenous peo-

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ples known as tribal people in India. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres in his message said “around the world, indigenous people have been at the forefront in demanding

Dr. Rameshwar Rao S. Raghupathy

environmental and climate action . Lapsed enforcement of environmental protection laws during

Prof. I.V. Muralikrishna

the crisis has brought increasing encroachment on indigenous peoples’ territories by illegal min-

Editor Dr. P. Narayana Rao

ers and loggers. The UN System remains committed to realizing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and to bolster their resilience.” During COVID 19 crisis, a week after India announced the auction process for coal blocks for commercial mining, he told

Associate Editors Sweta Pendyala Dr. B.Ramana Naik

that there is no reason for any country to include coal in their COVID 19 plans and investments should instead be made in non-polluting energy sources. Last year in November 2019, Guterres had emphasized the need to stop the creation of new power plants based on coal in the future and

Sub - editor Swarajyam P.

addiction to coal need to overcome because it remains a major threat in relation to climate change. As we know coal is the biggest carbon emitter of all fuels and it also fills our air with

Design arcongraphics@gmail.com

carcinogenic particles and toxic chemicals, none of which is priced into the cost of burning that fuel.During lockdown period, we all enjoyed the unusually clean air and clear skies, reduction in

Edited, Printed & Published by

carbon dioxide emissions due to shut down of coal power plants. The auction of coal blocks for

P. Narayana Rao on behalf of society

commercial mining in adivasi heartlands of India is going to increase the environmental pollu-

for environment and education, hyderabad.

tion and endanger the public health risk during COVID times and destroy the habitats of a large part of the adivasi population and wildlife. Open cast mines not only cause more pollution but

Address for communication 302, Padma Nilayam,

also destroy forest land, water bodies and biodiversity. Since Independence, an estimated 12 mil-

St.No. 1, Shanti Nagar,

lion have been displaced due to coal mining out of which 70% is adivasi population. The record

Hyderabad - 500 028.

of their resettlement and rehabilitation is dismal and they are left to the vagaries of nature. At a

email: nraopotturi@yahoo.com contact: 9247385331

time when many countries are phasing out coal, dismantling and decommissioning thermal power plants and even big banks are not in favour of financing thermal projects, India’s focus on coal exports would amount to more displacements of our indigenous people. The civil socie-

(The views expressed by authors may not be necessarily be the same as those of magazine)

ty organizations have come out against Indian Government’s move. So in the interest of protection of environment and our tribal population, Government of India has to abandon such move.

August 2020

3 Environment & people

content

7 Medical advantages and health benefits of Triticale

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Leveraging Clean India Mission to boost climate action

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Fever from the Forests

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Despite an early vision for sustainability in mining,

Nourish the undernourished: Building pandemic resilience of the nation builders 5

is India’s progress faltering?

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An Ode To Chandel- The Breathtaking Beauty Of Manipur

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Locals brace to fight for their Oran in Rajasthan

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The Indus Dolphin Is Struggling in India

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Women suffer the most from climate displacement

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Using Dharma in Our Fight Against COVID-19 and Climate Change

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Discoveries and rediscoveries: Stoneflowers in northeast India

Transmutation of indigenous people in India in the name of developmental projects 12

Environment & people 4

August 2020

32

COVID-19 Is a Cautionary Tale for Climate Change Related Health Hazards

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Nourish the undernourished: Building pandemic resilience of the nation builders Arabinda K Padhee, Basanta K Kar and Pranab R Choudhury he COVID-19 associated lockdown has suddenly made visible the poverty and vulnerability of the millions of migrant workers, write the authors of this commentary.

Post-COVID, access to safe and nutritious foods would be a question mark if adequate policy measures are not taken in ensuring satisfactory production, aggregation and marketing while also making the food available to the vulnerable population.

Without, urgent, timely and integrated nourishment through supplemental nutrition, special care and institutional rehabilitation, disease and malnutrition will be rampant and translate to a heavy toll on the future GDP and undo the impetus intended via postCOVID revival and reform packages.

The COVID-19 pandemic has further worsened India’s hunger and malnutrition woes, more so for the millions of informal workers, on their way back home or struggling to meet two ends in their urban and rural homes. Their embedded informality over labour, land, housing tenure, has uprooted and shaken them with loss of income, occupation and habitat, multiplying

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their already entrenched nutrition vulnerability.

Given the already acknowledged multidimensionality of nutritional problem and its significant connection to immunity, further oversight or negligence, implicates a heavy toll on these de-facto nation builders, either through COVID-19 infestation, poised for community spread now or en-route the lockdown hunger and its chronic accompaniment, the hidden hunger, often used to denote micronutrient malnutrition.

India ranks low at 102 in the 2019 Global Hunger Index, below its neighbours, Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, with documented poor-

er malnutrition level among the rural poor, agriculture labourers and migrant workers, pregnant and lactating mothers and children.

Without urgent, timely and integrated nourishment through supplemental nutrition, special care and institutional rehabilitation, the infestation of this cohort will be rampant while their malnutrition will translate to a heavy toll on the future GDP. With the rele-

vant loss to GDP, estimated between 4% to 8%, it may undo the impetus intended via post-COVID revival and reform packages.

The COVID-19 associated lockdown has suddenly made visible the poverty and vulnerability of the millions of migrant workers.

Their informality is not limited to their urban workplaces; back in their rural homes, where they are headed now, they are also informal labourers and farmers.

These landless agriculture labourers, tenants and small farmers are the rural food producers, city-makers, urban manufacturers

being excluded.

To overcome ration-card limitation, the government has now announced two months of free food to an additional 80 million migrant workers, without a card. Though temporary and not well-balanced, it should at least improve the outreach of pandemicresponse food ration — better than the 86 percent, that is reported by a recent survey.

Adequate caution and leakage-plugging, however, is called for, with participation of local governance institutions and civil society members.

The lockdown made visible the poverty and vulnerability of migrant workers in India. Photo

by Indrajit Das/Wikimedia Commons.

and service providers, who feed the nation, take care of the citizens in their homes and nurture its health and nutrition. Together constituting more than half of India’s population, this group however remains ultra-vulnerable to hunger and hidden hunger, thanks to their informal and insecure tenure. They are the hardest hit with their women and children during the pandemic.

The declaration of extra allocation of cereal and pulses for the next three months to about 810 million people under the Pradhan Mantri Gareeb Kalyan Yojana with ration cards reflects the appreciation of this hunger by the government. With studies indicating exclusion and inclusion errors as well as leakage in Public Distribution System (PDS), and estimating a low share of PDS grains reaching the intended, most of these vulnerable groups, however, run the risk of

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August 2020

The exclusion challenge, unfortunately, also plague the acclaimed Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) scheme, PM KISAN. The Finance Minister announced 91.3 million farmers to have received the installment related to COVID-19.

An ongoing survey by Centre for Sustainable Employment, Azim Premji University, shows the outreach to just 24 percent. Considering the number of farmers as per Agriculture Census, 2015-16, the PM KISAN net still excludes 4 out of every 10 farmers. Also not included are the 144 million agriculture laborers (Census, 2011) and about 25 million tenants (NITI Aayog, 2016) — in absence of land records, an eligibility criteria of the scheme.

The nature, outreach and performance of the food and cash transfer schemes and the persistent hunger and malnutrition of the

vulnerable, call for a more holistic nutritional response. And the expanding COVID-crisis hitting harder on these informal workers, demands these measures to be expeditious and inclusive.

The target population is converged in rural India, where the unfinished land reform agenda and changed farming imperatives and agrarian relations have increased informal tenancy along with fallowing of land.

With about 25 million hectares fallow land available and efficiency of small farms well documented in terms of higher production and net income, formalisation of tenancy focusing on small farmers can be a big first leap forward.

This lockdown hunger is not the only worry. Post-COVID, access to safe and nutritious foods would be a question mark if adequate policy measures are not taken in ensuring satisfactory production, aggregation and marketing while also making the food available to the vulnerable population.

Land leasing reforms to promote smallholder farming Evidences suggest that small farms, remain the most adaptive, demonstrating higher efficiency in terms of income and production than larger farms. However, highly pervasive and increasing tenancy has weakened Indian agriculture, reducing total production, by depriving tenants’ access to credit and other entitlements.

Implementation of Model Land leasing Act, 2016 developed by the NITI Aayog, can offer security of tenure to existing rural tenants as well as to the returnee migrants willing to farm. This would potentially trigger productive utilisation of land and labour and augment farm and food production, by enhancing access to formal credit and farmentitlements.

Gram Panchayats can be empowered to lead village-wise listing of potential tenants and enumeration fallow lands, as demonstrated in Kudumbashree in Kerala and AP. Legitimately, they can also facilitate convergence of MGNREGS for land development and create opportunities of women groups around farm value chain through livelihoods missions, augmenting rural income and local availability of farm-inputs and processed nutritious food.

Strengthening small-farm diversification and local food value chains Small family farms, globally and in India

are known to absorb more labour, while intensifying and diversifying production system in small areas. They can easily shoot up production of pulses, millets, tubers, vegetables, fruits, and livestock-products viz. egg, milk and meat. Availability of these food, rich in micronutrients locally is critical to boost nutritional status of women and children already suffering hidden hunger due to constrained production and the supply chain disruption of such foods during COVID-19.

Post-COVID agriculture package announced by the government, can be made nutrition enabled, with such steps while also promoting local production and value chain development around nutritious foods, thereby generating more formal employments and income locally for farmers, women and their collectives: Self-Help Groups and Farmer Producer Organisations.

Supporting non-timber forest produce collection, value addition and marketing through livelihood missions and ongoing forestry projects, by the tribal women collectives, is critical to increase cash flow among the vulnerable tribal communities. Allowing forest-foraging visits by women, can increase collection and consumption nutritious forest foods at free of cost, through sustainable biodiversity utilisation and conservation.

With a nutrition-orientation, micro, small and medium enterprises can boost up productions along local nutrition value chains in rural India and thereby improve access to safe and nutritious diets, while also creating local avenues for employment.

Leveraging ongoing pandemic management for a malnutrition-free India Along with increasing production and availability, enhanced nutritious food absorption esp. by the women and children is critical to address hunger and malnutrition.

In this direction, POSHAN Abhiyaan, with its mandate for reducing stunting, undernutrition, low birth weight and anaemia by 2022, can help in addressing malnutrition management while also assisting in pandemic infection management.

Grassroots public health, nutrition and agriculture functionaries, can be deployed with essential health supplies, behaviour change communication materials, home visit planners, advisories on nutritious food production, processing and consumptions with messages epidemics. People’s movement,

already envisaged in the Abhiyan, can be reoriented to focus on infant and young child and pregnant and lactating women feeding through a campaign engaging women volunteers. Engaged on wages, these women can also help in nutrition sensitisation and monitoring of informal-worker families at local quarantine centres and at their rural homes.

Managing food waste and food loss Approximately one-third of the food produced is lost or wasted in the value chain.

During the ongoing crisis, such food loss or

wastage across the value chain must be minimised.

The lockdown has drastically affected the marketing of the food produce by the smallholder farmers. Central and state governments can introduce local procurement and distribution using channels of mid-day meals (MDM) and integrated child development services (ICDS) supplementary nutrition programs, engaging surplus workforce, women and men, now converged in the villages.

IT-enabled monitoring for evidencebased policy Data from the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) and the latest Comprehensive National Nutrition Survey (CNNS) reveal that malnutrition is the leading inhibiting factor for a healthier India.

Morbidity and mortality arising from infec-

tious diseases hamper the country’s GDP and economy and subsistence living of the poor.

It is time to coordinate building a robust IT platform to collect and consolidate relevant data, with a focus on these vulnerable groups, for informed decision making and inert-sectoral synergy.

At a time when hunger and malnutrition are already sitting pretty on the ultra-vulnerable informal workers; the COVID pandemic has compounded their burden. Like the one-health approach, a holistic approach spanning land-agriculture-nutrition is what

required to nourish these undernourished and accordingly the policy incentives must be repurposed.

There is an urgent need to go beyond the cash and food transfers imperatives and invest in building nutrition-resilience pathways for coping with COVID19.

Formalising land and labour relations in rural areas and localising production and value chain development of nutritious food through small farming and women-collectives can be a dignified way to add assets, incomes and food in the hand of informal workers. This would also help the nation builders now converging in rural India to trigger a rural revival, as Gandhi would have dreamt.

(Source: india.mongabay.com)

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7 Environment & people

Clearly, the rearing procedure is marginally more unpredictable, making the underlying generation somewhat more costly, yet once an unfaltering genetic line is set up, it is fundamentally an indistinguishable cost from some other grain crop.The primary makers of triticale are Poland, Australia, Germany, and France. Research is continuous to additionally enhance the development and nourishing substance of triticale. For the time being, we should take a gander at the wholesome substance that makes triticale so significant and sound.

A portion of the medical advantages and health benefits of triticale incorporate its capacity to enhance stomach related productivity, help heart wellbeing, increment recuperating and metabolic rate and many more. ourishment science has been an imperative territory of science for a long time, and a standout amongst the most fascinating advancements came in the late nineteenth century, when scientists reproduced wheat and rye together, which are two of the most critical oat/grain staple sustenances on the planet, to deliver triticale.

The outcomes were out and out tremendous.

The goal was to pick up the high return and nature of wheat with the illness

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resilience and one of a kind wholesome organization of rye. What they found was that triticale really has more elevated amounts of most vitamins and minerals than both of their two contributing species, making it a perfect nourishing grub sustenance for animals.

As of late, nonetheless, it has turned into a well known wellbeing nourishment for people, likewise because of the way that it is flooding with helpful supplements. Triticale is usually found in different wellbeing grains, and can likewise be found in various diverse structures, either as the entire triticale berries, flour, oat, bread, pieces, or saltines.

In spite of the astounding medical health benefits of Triticale and supplement stuffed nature, triticale is just created in 29 nations around the globe and the aggregate collect yield is 15 million tons, which is overshadowed by the sums for more customary grain crops.

Triticale Nutrition Facts This half and half grain choice is something other than a logical accomplishment. It brags a higher substance of dietary fiber, protein, and minerals than both rye and wheat, making it a veritable “super oat�. Triticale is a rich wellspring of manganese, press, copper, zinc, phosphorous, calcium, potassium, and magnesium, and additionally fundamental vitamins, including the whole B-group of vitamins in critical amounts and vitamin E. Health benefits of Triticale (Triticosecale) 1Diabetes Control For those individuals experiencing diabetes or in danger for building up the condition, triticale can help in an assortment of ways. As a matter of first importance, the high fiber substance of triticale (half higher than wheat or rye) implies that glucose levels are adjusted, which is the principle issue for diabetics. The circulatory system is overflowed with basic sugars and glucose which

causes significant issues; luckily, fiber keeps this.

Furthermore, the enormous substance of manganese found in triticale is a second line of resistance for diabetics. Manganese is a practical piece of different enzymatic procedures in gluconeogenesis, which is the manner by which the human body transforms sugars into fuel, as opposed to retaining it into the circulatory system. This benefits of Triticale furnishes us with more vitality and more directed levels of glucose.

cell generation all through the body can be expanded, metabolic and enzymatic procedures can be streamlined, and general real capacities can be undeniably effective.

Proteins are the building blocks of cells, as they can be separated into their segment amino acids and afterward re-organized into whatever materials our body needs to remain solid. Alongside protein, triticale additionally contains manganese, folic corrosive, and various other dietary components that are basic for cell generation.

2Triticale Enhances Digestion As specified above, benefits of triticale uses is an essential wellspring of dietary fiber (19 grams for each glass), which makes it great as far as human assimilation. Dietary fiber builds up stool, go sustenance through the stomach related tract speedier, and accelerate the procedure of ingestion and discharge.

This implies any poisons in the insides are wiped out faster, and it additionally expands proficiency of supplement assimilation, accounting for more nourishment (and subsequently, more supplements). High fiber weight control plans help to diminish stoppage, looseness of the bowels, swelling, cramping, and other gastrointestinal conditions, much more genuine ones like Crohn’s infection, gastric ulcers, and even colon growth.

5Lifts Bone Growth

3Lifts Circulation Red platelets are enter components in human wellbeing, as they convey the oxygen to all parts of the body, including crucial organ frameworks, skin cells, and muscle tissues. Iron, copper, and folic corrosive are for the most part vital segments in the generation of red platelets, and triticale has every one of the three of these in critical levels. This implies RBC tally and flow increments, in this way boosting the speed of recuperating of different tissues and cells, enhancing metabolic productivity, expanding hair development, and giving the body adjusted vitality levels.

4Builds Cell Production Similarly likewise with fiber, triticale health benefits has a higher substance of protein than either wheat or rye. This implies

Benefits of triticale is a noteworthy wellspring of minerals, a large number of which assume a vital part in the creation of bone tissue. Zinc, phosphorous, calcium, and manganese are on the whole vital parts of bone creation and quality in the body. Individuals with fragile bones or maturing individuals who are encountering age-related bone debasement would do well to add triticale to their eating routine, as it can altogether support bone development, accelerate bone mending, and counteract conditions like osteoporosis.

6Calms Asthma The most astounding substance of minerals found in triticale is manganese, and keep-

ing in mind that this isn’t generally the most examined mineral in our eating routine, it is surely a great one in these amounts. There is over 300% of the day by day suggested admission of manganese in a solitary serving of triticale.

Manganese serves various capacities, as of now clarified, yet it likewise is a co-factor in manganese superoxide dismutase, which is a ground-breaking cancer prevention agent. Abnormal amounts of manganese and this chemical have been associated with a decrease in oxidative pressure conditions, including asthma and different skin condi-

tions.

7Anticipates Neural Tube Defects Noteworthy levels of folate in the body imply that pregnant moms can shield their kid from neural tube absconds. The inadequacy of folic corrosive (one of the B-vitamins) can be anticipated by nourishments like triticale, which contain elevated amounts of this gainful and multi-practical vitamin. (healthlogus.com)

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9 Environment & people

Managing waste more efficiently through a systemic and people-centric approach will help India curb greenhouse gas emissions Neeta Vaswani, Tejas Deshmukh t a global scale, the waste management sector makes a relatively minor contribution to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, estimated at about 3-5% of total emissions caused by human activities in 2005. However, the waste sector is in a unique position to move from being a minor source of global emissions to

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becoming a major saver of emissions.

Although minor levels of emissions are released through waste treatment and disposal, the prevention and recovery of wastes (as secondary materials or energy) avoids emissions in all other sectors of the economy. A holistic approach to waste management has positive consequences for greenhouse gas emissions from the energy, forestry, agriculture, mining, transport, and manufacturing sectors, according to a report by United Nations Environment Programme.

Over the past decade, India has fared well with its commitments to the climate action targets of Paris Agreement, especially with the adoption of National Electricity Plan in

2018. While the reforms in energy sector backed by strong policy commitments are commendable, it is high time for India to reform policies in the area of waste management to augment its efforts on climate action.

The expanding landfill sites in the country are posing a threat to environment, biodiversity and human health.

Of the total waste generated in the country, only 46.03% solid waste is processed, according to data available on solid waste generation and processing. Chandigarh and Chhattisgarh lead the table, standing at 85% and 84%, respectively, while states like West Bengal are at the bottom, processing only 5% of the solid waste generated.

Nuances of Clean India Mission While the problem has captured attention of policymakers and finds mention in national level programmes like the Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM or Clean India Mission), there is a lag in policy implementation due to hidden challenges that we now try to unfold here.

With the culmination of providing household level sanitation facilities in 2019, the Ministry of Jal Shakti — which was formed in May 2019 by merging the Ministry of Water Resources, River Development & Ganga Rejuvenation, and the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation — has geared up to move towards its next agenda of facilitating solid and liquid waste management in rural and urban areas.

The release of Rural Sanitation Strategy document 2019-29 in September 2019 indicates the aspiration of the ministry towards sustaining the attained ODF (Open Defecation Free) status and move towards addressing waste management issues in urban and rural areas of India.

Before we plan to step higher on the SBM ladder, it is important to understand the difference in complexity of issues in sanitation and waste management. While the former held the challenge of scaling up sanitation facilities to 102.8 million households as on March 2020, the latter is a more complex problem, having challenges beyond that of scale, as it entails identifying and implementing area specific technological solutions.

There is an urgent need to view the issue through a systemic lens, not a systematic one. The agenda of providing toilets at household level required investment of time and finance on a large scale. There were huge administrative overheads in reaching out to every village, reiterating the process of disbursing funds to the beneficiaries and building capacities of stakeholders for toilet construction, but technical barriers were minimal as toilet designs were specified by the government based on land topography.

With appropriate designs at hand, efforts were directed mostly towards replication. In contrast, solid and liquid waste management demands exhaustive technical skills and specialised knowledge. Each town or village differs in terms of the quantum of waste generation, extent of drainage system coverage, existing capacities of solid waste collection

and geographical challenges. This necessitates area specific solutions, indicating the need for decentralised knowledge management support at the ground level.

Support at the grassroots In India’s three-tier governance system, knowledge support organisations hold a key position, whether it is assisting in formulation of policies and laws at the central and state level or devising and implementing innovative solutions fitting the local context.

While the former is aided by institutions like NITI Aayog and Parliamentary Standing Committees, the latter largely depends on the willingness and participation by local support systems like civil society organisations, technology experts and community-based organisations.

The knowledge management support to the first tier of governance is well institutionalised and regularised, contrary to that at the second and third tiers, where such support is rare. However, it is the third tier which has a direct interface with the beneficiaries and faces implementation challenges.

To succeed in the mission of waste management, a sustainable source of support in terms of domain expertise, knowledge sharing, and planning is essential at the third tier.

In this context, the guidelines of the first phase of SBM suggested formation of special committees for SBM at district, block and village levels.

However, these committees have not been very effective. This apart, many states are yet to form even the District Planning Committees (as per Article 243ZD of the Constitution of India) that aim to consolidate the development plans of panchayats and municipalities into comprehensive district development plans.

People-centric approach to manage solid waste The constitution of legislated committees and knowledge groups at the third tier are vital to ensure that permanent support system for planning and directions regarding waste

management are in place. Andhra Pradesh recently launched a village-level secretariat system to ensure effective last mile delivery of 500 types of services.

This is a welcome move pertaining to administrative decentralisation. A similar model for decentralisation of knowledge support can be considered. The presence of such a system shall further help to mobilise and regularise the support from technology partners and NGOs. A dedicated, responsive and active governance system committed towards the purpose of waste management is expected to boost the confidence of external partners to invest their resources even in remote regions, which remain neglected so far.

In the absence of a comprehensive sup-

port system, the how and whereabout of technological solutions and fund mobilisation towards managing waste remain unaddressed and stalls implementation of waste management projects. Taking elements from different solid waste management models in the country, the gradual step should involve moving towards an inclusive system where all three tiers of governance are able to solve locally arising waste management problems in a people-participatory manner, so that the attained solutions are sustainable.

It is then that India shall move towards waste processing rather than mere waste dumping and also complement the agenda of Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants along with sustainable land management highlighted by United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification.

(Source: indiaclimatedialogue.net)

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11 Environment & people

Adivasis in India, in spite of their very distinctive culture and beliefs, face innumerable difficulties even today. They are often being displaced and exploited in the name of developmental projects.

Nishitha Pokala ach year, August 9th is celebrated as ‘World’s Indigenous Peoples Day’, devoted to focusing on the Indigenous people all over the world. Indigenous people or Aboriginal people are ethnic groups who are the original or earliest known inhabitants of a particular area. In India, they are usually known as Adivasis. India constitutes about 104 million tribals as part of more than 600 unique tribes, forming one of the largest indigenous populations in the world.

Lately, India has been concentrating on industrial projects, dams, roads, mines, power plants and new cities to achieve rapid economic growth.

Due to this, Adivasis in India that contribute almost 34 percent of the total Indian population have been facing a lot of problems like forced transmutation in the name of development, poverty, nutrition etc. According to six cases document-

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Photo : iwgia.org

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ed so far by Land Conflict Watch, at least 1,90,000 of them have been forcefully evicted from their native lands since 2005 without compensation or rehabilitation.

Recently with EIA 2020 draft coming to existence and with the current pandemic situation, the condition of these tribals has worsened.

Due to the lack of a support system for good nutrition and health education, they are on the verge of extinction. While we celebrate the growth of our country, it is important to acknowledge the tyranny that they

participation of those affected.

•The policy also recognises the need for protecting the weaker sections of the society, especially, members of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. (Source: Ibid, p.

30).

In recent times, the Indian Government has introduced an implementation strategy and a tribal development plan to aid tribespeople displaced by the green national highway.

This policy includes the screening of the project, guaranteed com-

go through in every part of India.

pensations for the displaced people, preparation of social impact assessment report, establishment of grievance redressal systems and monitoring resettlement outcomes. It also encompasses various awareness campaigns involved delivering tribal and social welfare programs.

“We have also devised strategies to overcome individual impacts. For instance, agriculture productivity of tribals can be increased by creating awareness about crop rotation and debt levels could be reduced by encouraging the formation of selfhelp groups,” a ministry official said.

(Source: The New Indian Express).

It is imperative that new developmental projects must be planned to improve the standard of living of our citizens but not at the cost of our native people and their environment.

Thus, our Indian government should be mindful of indigenous people and introduce more policies to revive them to circumvent the extinction of these communities.

Policies formulated by Indian government to uplift Adivasis in India: The Government of India is constantly striving to safeguard the Adivasis by introducing new implementation strategies, revising more policies, bringing awareness, laying out new social welfare programs.

The Department of Land Resources has formulated a “National Rehabilitation and Resettlement Policy” in 2007 to sermon different issues related to land acquisition and rehabilitation.

•The National Resettlement and Rehabilitation Policy (NRRP) 2007 applies to all development projects leading to involuntary resettlement of people.

•The policy aims to minimise displacement and promote, as far as possible, non-displacing or least displacing alternatives.

•The policy also aims to ensure adequate rehabilitation package and expeditious implementation of the rehabilitation process with the active

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13 Environment & people

This is a slightly modified version of an op-ed first published in the Assam Tribune dated June 5, 2020.

Akash Deep Baruah tudies have shown that since 1980 three-fourths of the pandemics and emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) have originated from wildlife. Deforestation and habitat alteration are cited as the prime reasons for the transmission of zoonotic diseases from the wild.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization’s ‘State of the World’sForests’ report, 2020, forests cover roughly 31% of earth’s land area. Of the total global forest area of 4.06 billion hectares, roughly half is estimated to be relatively intact. The remaining half has been subjected to rampant deforestation and degradation, particularly in the last 50 years. Tropical rainforests, home to nearly 50 million species, have suffered the maximum loss, losing roughly 12 million hectares annually, or the size of 19 football fields per hour (FAO, 2020). The highest loss has taken place in the tropical rainforests of Central Africa, the Amazon Basin, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. The major drivers of forest cover loss are agricultural expansion, cattle ranching, logging, raising of commercial plantations and clearing for mining and human settlements.

Such widespread global deforestation has resulted in ecologically significant negative outcomes.

Deprived of natural habitat, wildlife has been forced to venture into newer areas, often close to human habitations. This has not only resulted in rising incidents of man-animal conflict, but also brought humans in closer contact with wildlife, rendering us dangerously vulnerable to the spread of diseases from the wild. The Smallpox virus, one of the earliest plague-causing pathogens, is believed by some authorities to have originated in tropical Asia early in the history of animal husbandry and largescale forest clearing for

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agriculture and human settlements. The current Covid-19 pandemic has further exposed how vulnerable mankind is to the dangers of human-wildlife interactions. The 1980s marked the beginning of rising incidences of pandemics and emerging infectious diseases(EIDs) such as Ebola, SARs, and MERs. Studies have revealed that about three-fourths of EIDs are zoonotic, i.e., transmitted from animals to humans.

Sometime during the late1990s, huge stretches of rainforest in Indonesia were cleared for raising pulpwood and palm oil

plantations. Deprived of natural habitat, resident fruit bats started seeking new homes.

One colony, belonging to the genus Pteropus, flew across the Malacca strait and settled in the village orchards of Kampung Sugai Nipah in Malaysia, carrying with it a deadly disease. Soon, pigs in the area started falling sick, presumably after eating fallen fruits that the bats had nibbled on. This was followed by the same sickness infecting local pig farmers, with affected people developing fever and severe brain inflammation. By the time the disease was identified as a (NiV) Nipah virus outbreak in 1999, 105 people had died. By 2018, the contagion had killed 373 people globally, including 61 in India.

Deforestation due to logging, and clearing of forests for agriculture and commercial plantations, has wiped out roughly 90% of West Africa‘s tropical rainforests, including those of equatorial Guinea. By 2013, Guinea had lost nearly 87% of its original forest cover. Meliandou is a small, remote village in Guinea’s Gueckedou Forest Region.

During December 2013, a two-year old boy fell sick to a mysterious disease after playing near a giant dead tree that was swarming with bats. He soon developed high fever, body aches, diarrhoea and died a few days later. By the time the illness was identified as an Ebola outbreak three months later, 30 people had died of the disease. By 2016, the disease, which had originated from wild bats, had claimed 11,300 human lives worldwide. Significantly, recent research published in Nature’s online journal, Scientific Reports, has reported an almost universal two year gap between deforestation and Ebola outbreaks in a particular region.

The Amazon rainforest covers a total area of 5.5 million sq.km, which is roughly 1.5 times the size of India. Nearly 60% of the Amazon rainforest occurs in Brazil, which has lost roughly 17% of its rainforest during the last 50 years, mostly due to conversion for cattle ranching and soy cultivation. Malaria has been a major rea-

son for human deaths in the Amazon basin. At the turn of the century, there were over 600,000 cases a year in the Amazon alone. Brazil has reported a steady rise of Malaria cases due to forest clearing and expansion of agriculture. According to Anthony Kiszewski, an entomologist at Bentley University, Massachusetts, Anopheles darlingi, the primary vector of malaria in the Amazon, appears to breed in warm, shady pools of water that often build up along the edges and roadsides of cleared forest patches. A study published last year in Scientific Reports has revealed that cleared forest patches between 0.1 and 5 sq. km. in size had reported the highest incidence of malaria.The study thus provides proof of one more direct link between deforestation and the origin of a disease from the wild.

The rainforests of Borneo, home to the Orangutan, are among the richest terrestrial ecosystems in the world.

Rampant deforestation between 1980-2000 for raising palm oil plantations has claimed nearly 40% of its rainforests. During that period more timber was harvested from Borneo than Africa and the Amazon combined.

When a malaria outbreak erupted in Malaysian Borneo in 2002, researchers found that the causal pathogen was Plasmodium knowlesi, colloquially known as “monkey malaria,” which is known to infect and proliferate in forest-dwelling macaques. Soon P. knowlesi became the most common cause for malaria in Malaysia.

Yellow fever is one of the most well researched diseases from the standpoint of its association with forests.

The virus that causes yellow fever is maintained in a transmission cycle of arboreal monkeys and sylvatic mosquitoes. Expansion into the forest by human settlements is a frequent cause of outbreaks. For example, the first outbreak of yellow fever in Kenya (1992 to 1993) involved a settlement where cases were limited to people collecting fuel wood or possibly hunting in the forest. WHO estimates that globally 30,000 yellow fever related deaths occur every year.

However, deforestation per se is not the cause behind the upsurge of EIDs. Forest destruction and habitat alteration, combined with growth in the human population and increased human-wildlife interactions, disrupt the regional environmental balance. This creates conditions conducive for the emergence of new contagions, which are then spread through global travel.

Against the backdrop of rising incidences of EIDs in the last four decades, the concept of ‘One Health’ is now gaining rapid momentum. The ‘One Health’concept recognizes that the health of humans is closely connected to the health of animals and the shared environment. In simple terms, it means that the destruction of natural forests presents an immediate risk to the health of the people living in that area.

(Source: conservationindia.org)

Eco

IQ

1. Whales can live a long time. How long can the oldest whale species live? a) 100 years

b) 200 years

c) 50 years

d) 75 years

2. After the 1986 moratorium on whaling, all commercial whaling ended. a) true

b) False

3. Which of the below countries continue to commercially whale today? a) Japan

b) Norway

c) Iceland

d) All of the above

e) None of the above

4. Commercial whaling is the last remaining threat to whales. a) True

b) False

5. Which of the following is a current threat to whale populations? a) Shipping

b) Fishing

c) Climate Change

d) All of the above.

August 2020

15 Environment & people

Directly or indirectly, the mining sector is a major driver of economic activities in India but it also negatively impacts the environment, degrades land, displaces communities and leads to conflicts.

Mayank Aggarwal ears before the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted by countries in 2015, India had come with a national framework to address sustainability issues in the mining sector in 2011.

In the past few years, the central govern-

Y

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ment has come out with more national plans to focus on sustainability in mining but the efforts are yet to gain momentum even as India plans to increase focus on the mining sector.

Experts, who have worked with the government, and in the private sector emphasise that India needs a transparent and robust approach to address social and environmental issues related to the mining sector.

Despite its known ill-impacts, the mining sector directly or indirectly contributes significantly to India’s economy. India had a vision to incorporate sustainability in this sector at least almost a decade ago, even

before the 2015 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) became the recognised standard for sustainability. But the implementation of that vision has failed to gain momentum and now, as India looks at increasing mineral production, sustainability in the extractive industry is back in focus.

Retired Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer S. Vijay Kumar, who was leading the Indian government’s Ministry of Mines at the time that 2011 Sustainable Development Framework (SDF) for the Indian mining sector was developed, explained that at the national level there is an intention to ensure that there is justice for local communities and environment impacted by the mining sector, but what needs to strengthen is the implementation at the ground level.

Kumar, who is now a distinguished fellow at The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), said that mining by its very nature is destructive, it degrades the land, impacts forests and biodiversity and influences water among other things. “The question is what do we do in order to reduce the negative impact of mining and that is what India tried to document with the SDF 2011. The solutions could be a more efficient use of minerals including recycling rather than increasing mining and steps to mitigate the negative

impact of mining which includes measures like land reclamation after mining for use by local communities,” Kumar told MongabayIndia.

He emphasised that the idea behind the efforts is that when the land is returned (after mining) it should be done with an added value so that people do not feel exploited and that mining should have led to the creation of assets that give long-term support for communities and their livelihood.

“This is because the general grouse of local people impacted by mining has always been that mining makes the company and state governments rich but leaves people poor. The SDF 2011 and the subsequent SDGs in 2015 stress on such measures – like improving health and education facilities, water supply, land quality, etc.,” said Kumar who stressed that the push for sustainable development in the mining sector was born out of many small movements in India that were led by poor and tribal communities who agitated and went to court when they felt cheated with the whole process of mining.

“However, the intention has not yet been realised or we can say that the rate at which the positive transition (development) is happening in the lives of people is very disappointing. It is not yet a ‘just transition’ instead it is just a transition. The ‘just’ part will come when local communities would become part of the whole process,” Kumar told Mongabay-India.

With global warming and climate change, the environmental cost of extractive industries is increasingly being debated and discussions around sustainability and ‘just transitions’ is gaining momentum.

India’s plans to ensure sustainable mining Following the SDF document in 2011, sustainable development became the buzzword in the lexicon of the Indian government. In 2015, the SDGs came into the picture when 17 goals were adopted by members of the United Nations. The goals call for ending poverty, protecting the planet, ensuring good health and education, focus on affordable and clean energy, provide clean water and sanitation, developing sustainable cities and communities, sought climate action and responsible consumption etc by 2030.

Although mining was not explicitly mentioned in goals, sustainable mining activities are integral to many of the SDGs. In fact,

mining has both positive and negative implications for the SDGs. A 2018 UN report had mentioned that mining has strong impacts on at least 11 of the 17 SDGs. For instance, it noted, mining is clearly relevant to SDG 1 (no poverty), SDG 5 (gender equality), SDG 6 (clean water and sanitation), SDG 7 (affordable and clean energy), SDG 8 (decent work and economic growth), SDG 9 (industry, innovation and infrastructure), SDG 12 (responsible consumption and production), SDG 13 (climate action), SDG 15 (life on land) and SDG 16 (peace, justice and strong institutions).

The report had stressed that throughout the life of a mine and the whole value chain

ing sector have been captured in a number of the SDG Goals.

“The SDG 8 (decent work and economic growth), SDG 9 (industry, innovation and infrastructure), SDG 12 (responsible production and consumption), and SDG 15 (life on land) provide relevant guidance on sustainable practices in the mining sector. Other than that, many mining companies provide health, education and other amenities in economically backward areas (as part of their corporate social responsibility work) where there is no government machinery, and hence do influence the SDG targets on poverty, health, education and hunger,” Bhushan told Mongabay-India.

of mining, efforts are required to protect the environment. This includes actions to minimise the depletion of non-renewable natural resources, following the polluter pays principle, resource efficiency, proper environmental impact assessments, transparency and accountability.

Chandra Bhushan, who is the President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of iForest (International Forum for Environment, Sustainability and Technology), a think-tank working on environmental and sustainability issues, said though there are no specific SDG targets related to the mining sector, the environmental, economic and social aspects of the min-

It is well known that mining poses critical challenges to the environment and communities and often mining activities end up in conflict with local communities.

Meanwhile, there is also increasing international pressure to tackle climate change by focusing on resource efficiency including recycling and tackling the amount of waste – something that is relevant to the mining sector too.

Considering these pressures, on a global level, governments of over 60 countries came together and formed an Intergovernmental Forum on Mining, Minerals, Metals and Sustainable Development (IGF) in 2002 to ensure that August 2020

17 Environment & people

the mining sector focuses on sustainable development, negative impacts are limited and benefits are shared by all.

India’s resource efficiency plans also focus on sustainable mining practices On the national level, India too has realised the importance of addressing sustainability in mining. Beyond the SDF for the Indian mining sector in 2011, the recent policy measures proposed or adopted by the government of India focus on this too.

For instance, the National Mineral Policy 2019 emphasised that environmental, economic and social considerations must be

(Sustainable Consumption and Production) predominantly rely on the principle of resource efficiency.

The draft policy said that resource efficiency has enormous potential for cost savings from reduced material use, reduction in social conflicts due to mining, increased job opportunities, reduction in climate change and environmental degradation. It noted that it could lead to a reduction in conflicts and displacement due to mining, lead to job creation in recycling sectors, preserve resources for future generations, reduce ecological degradation and pollution, greenhouse gas

taken into account as early as possible in the decision-making process so that mining is financially viable, socially responsible, environmentally, technically and scientifically sound, uses mineral resources optimally and ensures sustainable post-closure land uses.

“The government shall set a benchmark against which all mining operations may be evaluated in terms of their comparative performance on sustainable development framework and enforce commitment on part of the mining companies to adopt sustainable development practices for achieving environmental and social goals,” said the policy.

Similarly, sustainable development of minerals is also an integral piece of India’s draft National Resource Efficiency Policy, 2019. It noted that “while the attainment of all the SDGs requires to a large extent the sustainable management and use of earth’s natural resource base, no fewer than 12 of the goals refer directly to resources and the environment as fundamental to their achievement” and the SDG Goal 12

emissions, avoid industrial and solid waste generation and provide opportunities for the restoration of water bodies.

Regarding the extraction of non-metallic minerals, it observed that their use has notably grown. In 2010, such minerals constituted 38 percent of the total material consumption of five billion tonnes, and the same is projected to rise to 6.5 billion tonnes in 2030 and mining for them and wastes in the value chain poses socio-environmental challenges. Similarly, for metals, it said the demand is projected to be 0.8 billion tonnes in 2030.

Even India’s Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) submitted to the UN in 2015 focused on clean coal, renewable power and resource efficiency to usher in sustainability.

At the heart of all the documents that address sustainable development in the mining sector is the idea that the mining activities will be in conformity with environmental and forest laws, including waste manage-

Environment & people 18

August 2020

ment rules. However, ironically, the problems currently caused by mining - displacement, health issues, land conflicts, social inequality and poverty etc. that the government plans to address by incorporating sustainability in the mining sector – are in fact a result of years of unchecked mining activities.

Mining sector ills continues Despite a series of policies and plans to integrate the idea of sustainability in the mining sector, the progress has been tardy. The land conflicts due to mining, on average, affects over 21,000 people which is nearly double the number of people impacted by land conflicts due to other issues.

Assistant Professor at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Sambalpur Sumita Sindhi explained that regulations to protect the environment and ensure the rights of communities involved have had a very little impact on the ground when it comes to the mining sector.

“There is no doubt that overall improvement in the lives of communities and environment (like tackling land degradation) is an integral part of the sustainable development goals … the intent is very good but the actual performance on these parameters has been dismal. For instance, studies that I did showed a poor impact on the lives of women.

Women were not getting equal pay even if they were doing the same amount of work in mines, sex work in mining areas increase and they faced increased instances of violence with their husbands spending more on liquor due to higher earnings from mines,” Sindhi told Mongabay-India.

She further said that in many cases women had to cover longer distances to procure forest produce or for water which speaks poorly about the transition that came into their lives due to mining.

“What is needed is a stricter implementation of rules to ensure justice for communities and environment otherwise the problems will remain as it is despite a plethora of laws.

I also believe the environmental aspects of mining, including water issues, needs to be urgently looked at. This is also important from the perspective of climate change in the context of mining’s impact on land degradation, forests and water bodies,” she said. (source: india.mongabay.com)

An Ode To Chandel- The Breathtaking Beauty Of Manipur Diya Chakraborty handel in Manipur is a tucked away dream escape nestled amidst the hills of the North-east. As a doorway to the neighbouring country Myanmar, Chandel in spite of being a geographically significant place, this sleepy hamlet is also synonymous with the enrapturing beauty and bewildering charm of the unadulterated natural splendour. Home to a plethora of resplendent flora and fauna, Chandel and its near-by places are not just visually alluring but its authentic culture and the home-like hospitality of the inhabiting tribes, all secretly conspire to make the destination glide into your checklist of must-visits.

C

With each tribal community having something different to offer, visiting the place can amount to an intriguing and unique experience, for all that travel can offer. So why wait? Let us explore the lanes, bylanes and the nearby areas of Chandel, in this aweinspiring blissful vistas of beauty and tranquility. How To Reach Chandel: By Air: The closest airport to reach Chandel is the Imphal Airport, which is near about 49 km from this picturesque little town. By Rail: Chandel does not have a railway station of its own.

However, the Dimapur Railway Station, in Nagaland, located at a distance of 178 km, is well-connected with Chandel. The station is frequented by trains from the various major rail routes of the country. By Road: Chandel is well connected to cities around its vicinity, through the roadways. Chandel is easily

accessible through the roadways as the Chandel bus station is located right at the heart of the town. Best Time To Visit Chandel: The winter months of February to December make the most favourable time to visit the town of Chandel. In these months, the weather remains pleasant and windy with the temperature varying between 15°C and 25°C. 1. Tengnoupal P.C: Stefano Alemani Perched atop at a height ranging from 2,500 ft to 10,000 ft, Tengnoupal has an elaborate history of many archaic rules and reigns. The place's subsistence dates back to as old as the early 1630s.

Boasting of its glorious yesteryears, Tengnoupal has been home to the Pakhangha Ruler, followed by the Chinese who reigned over the place from 1631 until the Japanese attacked it during the Second World War. Huddled between the shimmering river streams of Barak and Manipur, Tengnoupal takes your breath away with its mesmerising natural splendour.

2. Moreh P.C: Joel Sparks Located at a distance of near about 70 km from Chandel, Moreh lies on the boundary of the countries India and Myanmar. With a distant view of the neighbouring country, Moreh is a place both for the nature enthusiasts and the business officials for several reasons. The place is a trading hub owing to its location. It is a tourist hotspot as well as the commercial hub for the people of Manipur. Wander the buzzing markets and shopping complexes and soak in the chaos and madness of this

bustling shoppers' ghetto.

3. Yangoupokpi – Lokchao Wildlife Sanctuary P.C: Sergey Pesterev Established in the year 1989, the Yangoupokpi-Lokchao Wildlife Sanctuary, sprawling over an expanse of near about 185 sq km, is home to

around 42 species of mammalians, 74 varieties of vibrant birds, 6 species of amphibians, 29 kinds of reptiles and 86 species of fish. The sanctuary is a natural habitat of a diverse range of flora and fauna and endangered species like the stumped tailed macaque, Himalayan black bear, slow lories, wild bear, India civet cat and the hoolock gibbon.

(Source: www.nativeplanet.com)

In western Rajasthan, near Jaisalmer, locals are battling with the administration to save a 600-year-old sacred grove, as high-tension power lines are being laid in the area.

Azera Parveen Rahman he Oran (sacred grove) is an oasis of life with a rich diversity of flora and fauna, and small water bodies, and serves as a grazing ground for camels, sheep and goats of local herders. Cutting of trees, however, is strictly prohibited by the locals.

The district administration maintains that

T Environment & people 20

August 2020

the power lines being laid are not in the Oran land. The genesis of this problem - and there have been similar battles earlier - goes back to 2004 when the government reclaimed this land and a portion of the Oran was left out in the official revenue department records.

For centuries, the trees in Oran, or sacred grove, near the Samvata village in Rajasthan’s Jaisalmer, have stood tall and untouched. Not a branch was cut, “not even for datoon (twig to clean teeth),� said a villager, Sumer Singh Bhati.

Spread across a massive expanse, this patch of vegetation with trees, bushes, and grasslands has supported a rich variety of flora and fauna.

The Oran has been the perfect grazing ground

for camels, sheep, and goats, thereby also supporting the livelihood of local herders.

A few weeks ago, however, excavators started making an appearance and trees began to be uprooted. For a solar power plant, someone was told.

Aghast, the locals raised the alarm and approached the district administration. It brought the excavation work to a halt. Still, as electrical lines continue to be laid in the area, the locals are bracing themselves for a long fight for the sake of this patch of greenery that they deeply revere and feel obliged to protect.

A history of conservation The significance of Orans, which are rich in biodiversity and usually have water bodies like ponds within, is that they are akin to oases in the dry state of Rajasthan. There are an estimated 25,000 Orans in the state, as per the NGO Krishi Avam Paristhitiki Vikas Sansthan, an organisation for the development of ecology and agriculture-livestock.

The Samvata Oran is one of the biggest.

Locals say that about 610 years ago, the then king of Jaisalmer had entrusted the responsibility of this Oran to the priests of the local Shri Degarai Mata temple. Since then, the temple had ensured that cutting of trees was forbidden and cultivation not allowed. Only the grazing of animals was permitted.

As a result, it has become a thriving patch of different local species of trees, like khejri (Prosopis cineraria), kumat (Acacia senegal), babul (Acacia nilotica), ker (Capparis decidua), and rohira (Tecomella undulata). There are different grass varieties, like sevan (Lasiurus scindicus), motha (Cyperus rotundus), and saanthi.

Consequently, this Oran supports a variety of wildlife, like blackbuck, blue bull, jackals and even the critically endangered Great Indian Bustard (GIB) has been spotted here.

While there’s no doubt about its ecological and economic significance—the Oran supports more than 5,000 camels, 20,000 sheep and 10,000 goats of local herders with fodder—its size has been the bone of contention between locals and officials.

Locals vs. administration “The Oran is 60,000 bighas in size and has been under the care and protection of the Shri Degarai Mata temple trust for more than

600 years,” Bhati, a camel herder and resident of the Samvata village, told Mongabay India. “But when the government reclaimed this land some years back (in 2004), it identified only 27,000 bighas as Oran.”

Bigha is a traditional unit for land measurement in India. In Rajasthan, 1 hectare is 6.25 bighas.

This “silence of the government agencies over the rest of the 33,000 bighas, despite locals having a solid record for the entire 60,000 as Oran is a battle that has been raging between the two for all these years,” said conservationist Sumit Dookia.

As a result, development projects—

Oran; it nurtures us and is our source of life,” Bhati, who has 300 camels, said. “Almost 5,000 camels and other animals graze here; if the Oran is destroyed, what will happen to us? Where will we go to feed our animals?”

Others echo similar sentiments. “The Oran feeds us by feeding our animals, providing them with water in the harshest of summers, and has never let them go hungry even in the worst of famines,” said Gopal, a sheep herder of a nearby village. “When we saw the excavators uprooting trees of the Oran for what we came to know was a solar power plant, we were shocked. The work has stopped now, but we are still wary of the

mostly solar and wind energy projects—have become a source of nervousness and anger amongst the locals who fear that the Oran would be destroyed by “encroachment.”

“This area is identified as a renewable energy site,” said Dookia, adding that there are several windmills south and east of the Oran, “whereas the northern side is now under solar power sites.”

There are 12 villages on the Oran fringes in Samvata. Most of the inhabitants are camel, sheep and goat herders , who are heavily dependent on the Oran for fodder for their animals. “We have always revered the

ways of the powerful.”

Oran or solar power plant?

For an outsider, this juxtaposition of a thriving local ecology versus clean energy projects may appear confusing. Parth Jagani of the Ecology Rural Development & Sustainability (ERDS) Foundation in Jaisalmer however, said that often green energy is “disguised” and that “one doesn’t know what the cost of the power generated is.”

“In 2010, 1,138 bighas of land was acquired in Nokh village near Jaisalmer by a August 2020

21 Environment & people

private company to set up a solar power plant,” Jagani told Mongabay-India. “The villagers were promised a bright future.

But the project collapsed.” The fiscal status of the project, he said, collapsed; as a result, the locals did not benefit, and the plant was under-utilised.

“And at what cost? Ecologically, that land was devastated. To install a solar plate, you need to dig seven-eight feet for the concrete base of the pillar and this makes the land around uncultivable,” said Jagani.

In the Oran near Samvata, high-tension electricity pillions have been installed and overhead electricity lines are being laid in between, which, locals say, is “very close the temple” and therefore encroaches the Oran land.

laid are not on the Oran land,” Mehta told Mongabay-India.

Elaborating more on this, he went on to say that a “765 MW power grid has been installed near a village” and that “electricity lines are just being laid between the power grids by the Power Corporation of India.”

The locals, are, however, not convinced and see this is as a ploy for encroachment.

Bhati said that in 2016, the revenue department had allotted a part of the non-official Oran land for a wind energy project through which windmills were to be set up.

“At that time, all of us from the 12 villages stood up against that decision and approached the district administration to stop the Oran and the ecology it supports from being impacted. It was an andolan, a

consider laying underground cables as overhead power transmission lines have been the cause of many GIB collisiondeaths.

The Jaisalmer district commissioner, however, reiterated that none of the activities was in the Oran, and hence was not a “forest department-related issue, otherwise, permissions (for the said work) would not have been given”. This, said the locals, was precisely the point: to declare this unrecorded Oran land as a Deemed Forest. A deemed forest has land rights with the revenue department but is managed by the forest department and this, said Dookia, in addition to a “clear boundary and a buffer area, with no power transmission lines inside and surrounding areas, since it’s a GIB habitat” would be the ideal

Chanan Singh of the Shri Degarai Mata temple committee said, “We have met the district collector regarding this issue. Our demand since 2004 has been the same—the entire 60,000 bighas should be declared as Oran so that, as per the Supreme Court order, it will be considered a Deemed Forest and will get the protection against any such activity.”

When contacted, Namit Mehta, the district commissioner of Jaisalmer, refuted the claims of any construction or uprooting of trees in the Oran. “There is some confusion over the Oran land. A local delegation did come to meet me and I have assured them that the electricity lines which are being

stir. They finally agreed,” Bhati said, “We didn’t agree back then, we won’t give in now — despite the pressure being high on us.”

Despite repeated attempts, Power Grid Corporation of India Limited was not available for comments.

Another point to be considered, said Dookia, is that since there are records of the critically endangered GIB being spotted in the Oran in winters — two GIBs were spotted here in November 2019 — electrical lines must be underground in that area and not overhead as are being laid. In February this year, the Supreme Court had asked the Rajasthan state government to

case scenario to conserve the ecology of this area.

“We are not against any solar power or other development project,” Bhati said at the end, “All we are saying is that develop these projects far from us. This Oran is a forest and our life source.”

Environment & people 22

August 2020

(source: india.mongabay.com)

ave you seen dolphins in your area?”

“H

“You mean bhulan machi [long-lipped fish],” replied 22-year-old Bagha, a boatman who ferries people on the banks of the Beas river in Karmuwala village of Punjab’s Taran Taran district, 250 km from Chandigarh.

Bagha quickly shared a recent video he shot from his mobile phone, showing a grey figure breaking the river surface, some 15 km upstream of the famous Harike wetland.

He said a brown coloured bhulan lives here too with her calf. “Sometimes they chase my boat,” he smiled.

But not everyone is lucky like the boatman to spot this rare mammal. These dolphins, found in the Beas river, are the rare Indus dolphin species, reveals research by ecologist Gillian T. Braulik and other field research studies.

Indus dolphins (Platanista gangetica minor), locally known as bhulan, are among the eight freshwater dolphin species currently existing in the world. Found in freshwater sources like rivers, these dolphins cannot survive in saltwater like their marine counterparts. These dolphins are blind and depend on echolocation.

Members of the Indus dolphin family are found in Pakistan as well, where they

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have started recouping in recent years. But they are a rare sight in India, reduced to the single digits over time.

According to Gillian Braulik’s 2012 research paper, Indus dolphins used to range freely throughout 3,500 km of the Indus River system, from the delta in Sindh, up to the foothills of the Himalayas in the Indus and its five tributaries – Jhelum, Chenab, Beas, Sutlej and Ravi rivers. This was prior to the 1947 India-Pakistan partition.

The rivers in pre-partition times were seamless and unpolluted. There were no irrigation barrages and dams which, when came up in big numbers, degraded the Indus river dolphin’s habitat leading to a decline in population, revealed field studies of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).

Other factors like gillnet mortalities and water pollution due to the discharge of industrial effluents and agricultural runoff also threatened the freshwater mammal.

The Indus dolphin along with the more popular Ganges river dolphin is a subspecies of the South Asian River dolphin. According to WWF studies, there is growing evidence that these are genetically different and may be, in the near future, separated into two species.

State of the dolphin across borders In Pakistan, however, the Indus dolphins are not that rare a sight as in India. A December 2017 report by the Pakistan division of WWF counted approximately 1,816

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August 2020

Indus dolphins, an increase of 50 percent since 2001. Their current estimate is 1,987 individuals, confirmed Uzma Khan, WWF Pakistan’s director, biodiversity.

Khan told Mongabay-India that all the dolphins are restricted to the Indus river mainstream but the highest density is between Guddu and Sukkur barrages (Sindh and Balochistan provinces) with 1,200 dolphins. This area is also protected under the Sindh wildlife law as an Indus River dolphin reserve.

Meanwhile in India, the dolphin population is significantly lower. A 2007 survey by WWF-India found just five Indus dolphins in Indian rivers. WWF India’s survey in 2018 pegged their population to be between 5 and 11 individuals – not much different from earlier surveys.

“These surveys were held across all major Indus River tributaries – Beas, Sutlej and Raavi – but found dolphins only in a limited stretch of Beas river. There have been no reports of dolphin sightings in another Indus tributary, river Jhelum,” said Suresh Babu, Director-Rivers, Wetlands & Water Policy, WWF-India.

The low population of the Indus dolphin in Indian rivers, according to WWF field researchers and government conservationists, is a sign of worry.

“Two years ago dolphins in Beas had a narrow escape when the release of a chemical fluid from a sugar mill situated on the shore of the river killed countless fish and

other aquatic animals,” said Gitanjali Kanwar, a WWF India senior project officer, working with the Punjab Forests and Wildlife Preservation department on their conversation efforts.

She said the dolphins somehow survived that time but it does not mean that the fear is over. “Their number is too small and any sudden catastrophe can wipe them off completely,” she said.

Beas is spread over 500 km originating from Manali in Himachal Pradesh and merges with Sutlej River at Harike Wetland in Punjab. But it is the 100 km stretch between Amritsar, Taran Taran, Ferozpur and Kapurthala districts where these dolphins mostly live.

Kanwar said that of all areas, Taran Taran is the real hotspot in terms of population concentration as five villages – Karmuwala, Gadka, Mundapind, Dhunda and Govindwal – are major potential areas to locate these dolphins along with Desal village in Kapurthala district, she said.

“It is because this particular stretch has enough food availability, adequate water flow and depth needed for their survival, something that eroded in the remaining part of the river and other tributaries due to construction of irrigation barrages besides heavy water level pollution,” she said.

According to data from Punjab Pollution Control Board, while pollution level in Beas is still moderate, Sutlej River, where Indus dolphins once lived, is E Category River, a

status accorded to those water bodies having extremely high pollution levels.

Krunesh Garg, member secretary, PPCB said that they classified Beas river to category B (moderate pollution) after sewerage treatment plants at several points became functional last year specially in the area especially at discharge point at Mukerian upto Harike that was earlier classified in C category. As far as Sutlej is concerned, it has been ranging from category C to category E and efforts are being monitored at the level of Punjab chief secretary and river rejuvenation committee to reduce its pollution level.

We have district level committees and action plan to improve the quality of our water bodies, he said.

“The survival of river dolphins is vital because their mere presence is an indicator that our river bodies are doing fine,” said Kanwar.

Official discovery in India in 2007 The “official” discovery of India’s few remaining Indus river dolphins is linked to an episode in 2007 when an India Forest Services (IFS) officer, Basanta Rajkumar, posted in Punjab spotted it while touring Harike wetland on a motorboat in December, 2007.

Later the endangered species management wing of the Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun confirmed the finding too.

People living along the Beas River however, have always lived with these dolphins.

60-year-old Dilbag Mohammad from Karmuwala village in Taran Taran district told Mongabay-India that the government officers expressed surprise at seeing these dolphins but he has been watching them since his childhood. “Even my elders often talked about presence of Bhulan Machi deep inside the river,” he said.

Additionally, the presence of dolphins in Beas river too has been well-documented in old gazetteers of Punjab’s Gurdaspur for the year 1914, 1930 and 1936.

But agencies responsible for wildlife preservation presumed the Indus dolphin population had been wiped out, before they were re-discovered in 2007.

Punjab’s Principal Chief Conservator of Forests, Kuldeep Kumar said that he can’t comment on why dolphins were not spotted before this sighted. There may be lack of communication between locals and wildlife people but sometimes, a small population,

like the one present here, protects itself by hiding for a long time, he said.

In Pakistan, conservation work focused around the species in Pakistan has been ongoing since decades. According to WWF Pakistan, there is more awareness about these species from their habitat protection to translocation of entrapped dolphins from irrigation canals. Since 1992, WWF along with the Sindh Wildlife department have led a programme rescuing dolphins stranded in irrigation canals, releasing them back into the main river.

“Historically Indus dolphin was hunted and oil was used as emollient for boats and for bait. No such cases have been reported in Pakistan for a long time,” said Uzma Khan.

Transnational cooperation Arati Kumar Rao, an independent envi-

ronment writer and photographer wrote in her 2018 blog that India’s few remaining Indus river dolphins have a fighting chance at survival only if we ensure a healthy river.

The stretch where dolphins live is already declared a conservation area, said Kuldeep Kumar, Punjab’s Principal Chief Conservator, said. Their prey base has been protected by banning commercial fishing since the sugar mill accident in 2018, and there has been better monitoring of the river’s overall health through official and community participation.

He said the presence of a calf with adult dolphins is a good sign that they are breeding. But the problem is that their population

is very limited and it needed to be recouped through translocation.

“In 2018, we tried translocation through Pakistan WWF – if they had some surplus population of Indus dolphins that can be brought here. But in the meanwhile, our relationship with Pakistan was not that good and we could not do much work on it later,” he said.

But he thinks that there may be a possibility in future to revive this proposal when India-Pakistan relationships improve and wildlife conservation gets more importance in transnational boundaries.

Uzma Khan, WWF Pakistan’s biodiversity chief, however, is cautious of the idea, saying that the population of Indus dolphins is not very big in Pakistan.

“Long distance translocation of these animals can be very risky. It needs to be care-

fully and scientifically evaluated if translocation of some individuals from Pakistan to India can actually help in securing the future of this very small population,” she said.

WWF India’s Suresh Babu also said that a comprehensive study by a multi-stakeholder group including government departments, experts, institutions etc. needs to be undertaken to understand the risks and benefits involved in such a translocation.

(Source: science.thewire.in)

August 2020

25 Environment & people

COVID-19 Is a Cautionary Tale for Climate Change Related Health Hazards Abhijit Mohanty limate change is already amplifying the spread of infectious diseases beyond their natural geographic range, warn scientists. The adverse effects of climate and environmental change are playing a hazardous role in worsening human health. Since the rate of animal-borne diseases has been increasing, changes to the climate are likely to affect the distribution of potential cross-over species, such as the recent coronavirus pandemic.

According to new research from Harvard University, coronavirus patients from areas which had high levels of air pollution, are more likely to die than patients from cleaner parts of the country.

Many countries are now taking comprehensive and stringent precautionary measures to contain the spread of COVID-19.

But, how we can prevent such global pandemics and other health hazards in the future? Protecting nature is the solution, suggest climate experts.

Climate change is causing temperatures

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to rise at an alarming rate, allowing mosquitoes, ticks and fleas to move into new areas.

Moreover, wet weather and the even snowballing high temperature, global heat wave, are collectively creating an ideal environment for numerous lethal organisms.

Take for instance, in warm conditions, mosquitos have the perfect breeding ground, but drought can also increase breeding when mosquitoes are attracted to water stored around households. A higher population of mosquito means there is growing potential for epidemics. For example, malaria kills a million people each year.

The World Bank estimates that by 2030, 3.6 billion people will be suffering from malaria – hundred million as a direct result of climate change. It is estimated that vectorborne diseases are responsible for more than 17% of all infectious diseases. According to a 2016 study by researchers at the Public Health Agency of Canada’s National Microbiology Laboratory, warmer winters are likely to increase the number of ticks that survive and prolong their active season, enabling them to reproduce and transmit dis-

eases, thereby increasing the number of people at risk.

Similarly, air pollution is responsible for 8.8 million deaths each year, a recent study said. The vast majority of these deaths are often reported in low and middle-income countries, where access to quality health care is often a distant luxury for many people with poor economic conditions.

However, the effects of air pollution amongst children and pregnant women are more detrimental in comparison to others, reveals a study. “If we want to protect our children, we need to make sure the air they breathe is not toxic”, Sonja Ayeb-Karlsson, a global health specialist at the University of Sussex and a member worked on the study, told Al Jazeera.

Nick Watts, who co-led the Lancet Countdown on Health and Climate Change study warned that health damage in early childhood is “persistent and pervasive”, and carries “lifelong consequences”. “Children are vulnerable to the health risk of a changing climate”, said Watts, and “Their bodies and immune systems are still developing,

leaving them more susceptible to diseases and environmental pollutants.”

According to a paper published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, with climate change, we can expect an increase in cases of heat cramps, heat exhaustion, and possibly fatal heat strokes. Additionally, heat stress can also cause or worsen cardiovascular and kidney ailments. Many experts believe that global heating and environmental disturbances could elicit the development of more novel viruses such as the coronavirus.

“Extreme heat will impact children, older people who suffer from chronic conditions”, said Medicine Professor Rexford Ahima of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. The effects will have more severe effects on those who live in underserved communities, according to Professor Ahima.

Zoonotic diseases “Some diseases, such as Zika, are spread by mosquitoes and ticks, and can be expected to spread as a warming world expands the animal’s geographic range,” warns Katharine Hayhoe, a climate scientist at Texas Tech and an author of climate change report, the National Climate Assessment. “Climate change can exacerbate the risks associated with viruses and diseases like influenza in general.”

Kirsty Short, a research fellow at UQ’s school of chemistry and molecular biosciences, “The environmental destruction associated with climate change can lead to an increased incidence of animal viruses, jumping the species barrier and crossing over into humans”, Short told ABC News.

It is seemingly clear that large scale anthropogenic, environmental changes are among the most important drivers of zoonotic diseases. Some of the key drivers include land-use change such as deforestation, agricultural encroachment, urban sprawl, etc.

Several research studies have revealed that animal-borne diseases are going to become more frequent due to the rapid destruction of nature.

Due to climate change and habitat loss, an increasing number of wild animals are changing their behaviour and migrating to new areas. Presently, more than one million species are at risk of extinction, due to harmful human activities, thereby making it inevitable that protecting nature is critical to

preventing a mass extinction. Take, for example, the massive deforestation in the Amazon, climate experts are predicting that the Amazon rainforest could turn into a ‘savanna‘ in 50 years.

The increasing rate of deforestation, which has soared across the globe is not only decreasing the biodiversity but also forcing wild animals to find new habitats for their survival, often driving them into close contact with humans. It creates perfect conditions for pathogens to move from animals to humans and thus increases the probability of epidemic outbreaks.

“Walls will not keep pathogens out”, said Ashish Jha, Director of the Harvard Global Health Institute. “No borders are going to protect us. That’s what awaits us unless we act now.” “Nature is sending us a message with coronavirus pandemic and the ongoing climate crisis,” declares Inger Anderson, executive director of UN’s environment programme.

“Failing to take care of the planet means not taking care of ourselves”, Anderson said, “It was always human behaviour that caused diseases to spill over into humans.”

According to Anderson, to prevent outbreaks like that of the novel coronavirus, we have to end both global heating and destruction of the natural world for farming as well as mining and housing, as both drive wildlife into contact with people.

Besides, the rate of spillover events, that led to severe disease outbreaks, has been increasing. It is time to promote and practice pragmatic surveillance of wild animals as part of an integrated infectious disease prevention and control strategy. Take, for instance, a zoonotic virus called ‘reovirus’ which was successfully discovered at an early stage, thanks to prior knowledge accumulated through the wildlife surveillance system, say scientists.

A study by researchers at the University of Chicago projected that, by 2100, climate change would kill roughly as many people as the number who die of cancer and infectious diseases at the moment. Today, it is the poor who bear a disproportionately high share of the global mortality risks of climate change.

“Climate change is potentially the greatest health threat in the 21st century”, WHO expert Diarmid Campbell-Lendrum, told Reuters, “We need to cut our carbon emissions; as two-thirds of the exposure to outdoor air pollution is from burning of fossil

fuels”, Lendrum adds. It should be noted here that, by reducing the burning of fossil fuels, we could avoid 2.5 million premature deaths each year by 2050, estimates the WHO. “This is a crucial year for global climate goals”, Somini Sengupta wrote in the New York Times. “The presidents and prime ministers are under pressure to get more ambitious about reining in greenhouse emissions when they gather for UN-led climate talks in Glasgow in November”. The conference will develop a roadmap that will guide nature conservation efforts for the next 10-years, within this period, it is targeted to slow global warming, preserve our ecosystem and conserve threatened species.

As research foretells, the rising global temperatures will alter the timing, distribution and severity of disease outbreaks, it is high time to accept climate change as a ‘global emergency’, take urgent action and uphold international collaboration.

According to the UN, we have mere 10-years

to prevent a 1.5 degree Celsius or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit, above the pre-industrial level. If we fail to reduce global emissions and keep the temperature below 1.5 degree Celsius, we can witness catastrophes as early as 2040.

Nature is mighty and scary, we need to respect it and stabilise the earth’s climate system, or else, humans will not have the requisite immunity to cope with nature’s wrath and swathes of the planet may become inhabitable. COVID-19 is a wakeup call by nature and it is already affecting humanity.

One thing is clear, that we cannot defeat nature, because there is no insulation from natural hazards.

(Source: science.thewire.in)

August 2020

27 Environment & people

Women and girls are more likely to be put in harm’s way when extreme weather events in developing countries like India displace millions of people every year Soumya Sarkar isplacement due to climate change is increasing worldwide, widening global inequities and disproportionately harming women and girls, a global aid group said in a recent report.

Women bear the brunt of the impacts of climate change. “Prevailing gender inequality often intersects with other forms of vul-

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nerabilities which limit women and girls’ access to resources and decision-making power, inhibiting their ability to withstand the impacts of climate change, access basic services and recover from climate-related disasters,” according to Evicted by Climate Change: Confronting the Gendered Impacts of Climate-Induced Displacement, a report by humanitarian non-profit CARE International.

The vast majority of those forced from their homes as a result of climate change live in developing countries like India.

Responsible for less than 4% of climate change-causing greenhouse gases, these countries lack resources to support alternative forms of climate adaptation, such as

drought-resistant seed varieties, floodwater management and early warning systems.

Developed countries are collectively failing to live up to their promise to deliver 100 billion USD in new and additional climate finance, the report said, adding that as many as 33.4 million people were displaced from their homes in 2019, and climate change played a role in 70% of these cases.

“Climate change induced displacement is a harsh reality for millions of people today,” said Sven Harmeling of CARE. “With global CO2 (carbon dioxide) emissions levels on a trajectory of a 3 degrees Celsius temperature increase or more, the situation may irrevocably escalate and evict hundreds of millions more from their

homes.”

Women more vulnerable There are a number of reasons for the increased vulnerability of women to the impacts of climate change. Since women are the primary caretakers of households and look after children and the elderly, they are often not able to leave vulnerable areas as easily as men. Poor women are 14 times as likely to die from a climate disaster than men, according to the report.

Women are largely left out of decisionmaking processes in which strategies for coping with climate change are acted upon.

If they were given greater control over these

boost their capacities, capabilities and confidence to adapt to climate change. It has done so through promoting sustainable agricultural practices and rainwater harvesting; supporting their inclusive and effective collectives to facilitate access to opportunities, entitlements, resources, services and markets; and improving governance and resources management.

In Jashpur district of Chhattisgarh and Buldhana district of Maharashtra, CARE works with over 4,500 marginalised indigenous women from 50 villages. These women are dependent on rainfed agriculture, particularly for paddy, and face many challenges due to climate change, including

processes, women would be able to lobby for essential resources, the report said.

“CARE’s experience tells us that when women lead in crises, entire communities benefit, and more effective and sustainable solutions are found. Perversely, however, they are rarely given a seat at the decisionmaking table,” said Sofia Sprechmann Sineiro, secretary general of CARE International. “This report shows us that climate change exacerbates existing gender inequalities, with women displaced on the frontlines of its impacts, bearing the heaviest consequences.”

In most countries, government funds for climate change mitigation and adaptation do not adequately give priority to women, the report said. At least 85% of the funding for climate adaptation projects should have gender equality as an objective by 2023, CARE demanded.

water stress, erratic rainfall, deterioration of soil quality and fertility and declining agrobiodiversity.

With changing weather patterns and very low expertise on how to adapt to these changes, the productivity of their paddy fields is worsening. The women need to migrate every year with their families to find work and food because their paddy fields are not producing enough.

After six years of programme implementation, from 2014 to 2019, women are now better able to plan their farming activities because they are engaged in participatory scenario planning. CARE says there has been an increase in income from agriculture production (33%), a decrease in food insecurity (only a fourth of the households are now food insecure), and a decrease in the number of days of seasonal migration (almost down to a third, from 31 days to 12 days per year).

Glimmers of hope In India, CARE works with women and girls among indigenous communities to

(Source: indiaclimatedialogue.net)

August 2020

29 Environment & people

Dr Ramana Dhara recent article in the European Heart Journal cites lessons from the Bhagavad Gita for healthcare workers in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors use the examples of Arjuna as the healthcare worker, and the Kurukshetra battlefield as the hospital. Arjuna is confused over his role in the fight – the metaphorical battlefield is already fraught with chaos and misinformation. The principle of dharma, the inherent order of reality nurtured by right thought and action, is invoked by Krishna, the embodiment of dharma. For the healthcare worker, this involves developing a sense of purpose to do what is right and not become paralysed by the outcome. Many Indians have identified with the philosophy and moral principles of the Bhagavad Gita as a guide to daily living.

A

The Mahabharata’s expositions on the relationship between human and nature eerily mirror the fraught relationship that has led to the COVID-19 pandemic. One view of the Mahabharata war is that it was, in essence, a property dispute between royal families that resulted in many deaths and possible destruction of the environment and ecology, as many wars are wont to do. Even before the war, the Pandava clan burnt the forest of Khandava-prastha along with many forest creatures to build their city of Indraprastha.

The residents of the forest, the Naga, did not forgive them and their descendants for the destruction of their habitat. There is a description of a snake sacrifice in the Adi Parva. Emperor Janamejaya, a descendent of the Pandavas, bore a grudge against serpents because his father Parikshit had died of snakebite. He decided to wipe out snakes by performing a sacrifice. The origin of the snake sacrifice is tied to the destruction of the Khandava forest by the Pandava, the ancestors of Janamejaya. Another episode in the Adi Parva narrates how King Sambarana neglected his administrative duties, causing

displeasure to the rain god Indra who then caused a drought in his kingdom.

The COVID-19 pandemic may also be seen as a property dispute, between human beings and their environment. The human race has destroyed the environment by appropriating ecological areas for their own profit. Such appropriation has resulted in a disturbance of the ecological equilibrium and resulted in the exposure of humans to viruses such as Ebola and the novel coronavirus, which were previously sequestered in animals. The disequilibrium caused by these exposures has resulted in huge losses to lives and economy.

Jane Goodall notes that the health of people, animals and the environment are intimately connected. She note that wildlife trafficking, the production of animal-based medicines, factory farming, and the destruction of critical habitats all can create enabling conditions for viruses to spill over from their animal hosts into humans.

Vast, and accelerating, extraction of fossil fuels and natural resources to power the world’s wants is destroying natural habitats and driving wildlife to extinction. The use and disposal of these resources has polluted

our air, water and soil with toxic elements, particulate matter and carbon. The latter is driving the climate crisis. Pollution, in turn, is posing escalating threats to humans and wildlife. In short, damage due to profligate resource extraction is being exacerbated by the consequences of their use and disposal.

Climate change has amplified extreme climatic events: heat waves directly increase morbidity and mortality among both humans and wildlife – and indirectly affect crops, increase the intensity of droughts and make wildfires ever more frequent and intense. Destabilised rainfall is manifesting in a greater fraction of short intense rainfall events separated by lengthening dry spells, both of which are decreasing fresh water availability. While this is bad news for each individual event, the effects are worse when compounded. The effects of longer, more intense summer heat waves followed more often by an erratic monsoon are far graver than each alone.

These are merely two of the manifestations of anthropogenic climate change. In addition, sea level rise threatens to increase groundwater salinity in coastal regions, ocean acidification killing corals and marine life, expanding ocean dead zones because of changes in ocean circulation, and much more. Environmental changes have far outpaced the rate of evolutionary change. While humans may be adaptable, wildlife is much less so. And eventually, their loss becomes our loss.

The conflict between human beings and their environment is exemplified by climate change, the long-term impacts of which lead to devastating effects on human beings. One of these is the concern that conditions have become conducive for the spread of infectious diseases.

For example, floods create conducive environments for numerous health consequences resulting from disease transmission. Floodwaters contaminated with human or animal waste can increase the rate of faecal-oral disease transmission, allowing diarrhoeal disease and other bacterial and viral illnesses to flourish.

Faecal-oral transmission of diseases is of particular concern in regions such as South Asia because of limited access to clean water and sanitation. Melting ice sheets and thawing permafrost because of accelerated rates of warming in high latitudes may release long-latent viruses and bacteria that modern civilisation has no experience with, and consequently, no natural resistance to.

It is tempting to think Mother Nature is sending us a warning to clean up our act in the form of the COVID-19 pandemic. Nature, however, has evolved as a random series of events with no specific agency, which has resulted in the formation and sustenance of life. But human beings do try to see order and organisation in life and the real dharma in this age and environment is to recognise that we have disrupted nature and put the environment and ecology at risk.

As an example from the Mahabharata, Krishna argues for the creation of an efficient administration to look after forests, and setting up of wildlife reserves and sanctuaries. It is in our best interests to take inspiration from examples such as these by finding alternative ways of living that do not involve the exploitation of nature and animals. And who should be the leaders of such a ‘dharmayuddha’? Naturally, it would be the young people of Greta Thunberg’s generation. They have the most to lose.

(Source: https://science.thewire.in/health/covid-19-pandemicmahabharata-dharma-climate-change/)

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31 Environment & people

A team of Indian and Chinese scientists stumbled across a new species of Didymocarpus, or stoneflower, from northeast India and China.

by Aathira Perinchery cientists have also rediscovered four species of stoneflowers, and reported India’s first record of a Didymocarpus species previously known only from Bhutan.

More surveys and explorations into lessstudied regions and flora could be spurring this spurt of Didymocarpus discoveries.

These gesneriads were also an ignored group of plants previously but more teams are studying these small herbs now, say scientists.

To anyone else, the dried herb pressed neatly into crisp white paper would have been just another herbarium specimen. But for scientists at the Indian Institute for Science Education and Research Bhopal’s TrEE laboratory (Tropical Ecology and Evolution Lab), it was an enigma. From the distinct physical features, doctoral

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researcher Prasanna N.S. thought it was a stoneflower.

The distinctness lay in several aspects including the creamy-white flowers the halffoot-tall plant bore. The plant in question had been collected by one of Prasanna’s teammates, Preeti Saryan, on her field trip to Nagaland’s Mount Saramati in 2018.

Prasanna and Preeti are researchers in the TrEE lab led by associate professor Vinita Gowda.

Prasanna pursued the mystery. It was definitely a Didymocarpus, or stoneflower: the group of plants he was studying for his doctoral research. Digging deeper, he compared the plant’s physical features to those of Didymocarpus specimens preserved in seven herbaria, including those at Kolkata’s Botanical Survey of India and London’s Natural History Museum. He pored over monographs, analyzed digital photographs

and online databases. In 2019, his efforts paid off: the plant’s unique morphology confirmed that it was a species new to science.

At the same time, a team from China led

by Lei Cai of Yunnan’s Kunming Institute of Botany had also stumbled across the very same species of stone flower from the province of Yunnan. In a unique collaboration, both teams shared their data. They published news of their find – Didymocarpus sinoindicus, named in honour of the teamwork between Indian and Chinese scientists – in a special issue of the journal Rheedea this May. Stoneflowers and India’s new species Closely related to the ornamental African violets and Episcias, plants of the genus Didymocarpus – also called “stoneflowers” probably because they often grow on wet rocks and stones – are distributed across south Asia’s wet forests. China is home to 34 species, while India comes a close second with 25, with most of them distributed in the northeastern states. Many are ‘narrow endemics’: species that have very small distributions, and are found nowhere else in the world.

The Indian and Chinese teams’ find of Didymocarpus sinoindicus is the latest in a string of new Didymocarpus species discoveries in India.

Earlier in 2016, scientists from Kerala described Didymocarpus moelleri from Arunachal Pradesh, a species that bursts into flamboyant orange blooms and grows only

in one location in the state. A team from the Botanical Survey of India also recorded Didymocarpus bhutanicus, previously know only from Bhutan, for the first time in India (in Sikkim) this February.

These discoveries are thanks to a renewed interest in Didymocarpus in recent times, said Prasanna.

“It used to be rather neglected genus before,” said Prasanna, who is currently studying the phylogeny and biogeography of Didymocarpus for his doctoral research.

The discoveries are also a pan-Asian trend: over the last five years, more than six species of stone flowers have been described from southeast Asia. Cai’s team, for instance, discovered the mauve-blossomed Didymocarpus anningensis from Yunnan in China in 2016 (three years later another team discovered D. brevipedunculatus, a new species of stoneflower that grows on rocky surfaces near seasonal waterfalls, from this

researchers can find more beautiful Didymocarpus species.”

The discoveries of new Didymocarpus species is “particularly encouraging” because like many other Gesneriaceae, they are indicators of “intact undisturbed forest ecosystems”, commented Dr. Michael Moeller, scientist at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh who has worked extensively on gesneriads. He did not participate in the study. Surveying and studying previously unexplored or underexplored areas will yield more species new to science, although they might be known locally for many years, he added.

Didymocarpus rediscoveries Targeted surveys were in fact what led Gowda and Prasanna to the rediscovery of four Didymocarpus species this year. Timing their field expeditions to catch the plants in bloom between July and September (peak monsoon months), the team forayed into

In their study, the team have also updated and amended the descriptions of these species. The other species rediscovered include Didymocarpus parryorum from south Mizoram which sports small, orange blooms; the mauve-blossomed Didymocarpus lineicapsa from north Mizoram; and Didymocarpus wengeri, which grows on steep clay banks in just two sites in south Mizoram and has been classified as “Critically Endangered” by the team based on the IUCN guidelines (they spotted just 52 individual plants in both locations).

Most of these species were not seen from their type localities but in sites close by suggesting that the plants have been present in the same location for almost 90 years without being recorded in recent explorations, says Gowda. More explorations in the northeast could reveal new species of Didymocarpus, she adds.

Apart from more explorations and thor-

very province).

Scientists have also described four other species of Didymocarpus from Cambodia and Vietnam. In 2019, scientists recorded the genus Didymocarpus for the first time in Laos (Didymocarpus middletonii, a new species), followed by the another (Didymocarpus albiflorus, which bears snow-white flowers) this year.

Surveys into previously less-explored areas are definitely helping scientists discover new Didymocarpus species, agrees Cai. Moreover, researchers don’t often spot the plants while they are flowering, he added.

“Someone may have collected it a long time ago, but they didn’t realize that it wasn’t described, just like Didymocarpus sinoindicus,” he wrote in an email to Mongabay-India. “With more careful observation and research, and some luck, maybe

Mizoram and its adjoining areas in 2017 and 2018. They specifically targeted ‘type localities’ or sites from where the first records of Didymocarpus species were made. Their explorations paid off.

One of the four species they rediscovered, Didymocarpus adenocarpus, has been recorded after 87 years. Though the plant was known to be found in southern Mizoram as per its first description in 1928, Gowda and Prasanna did not locate any plants in this area. The population of around 300 individuals that they did spot were restricted to a small 15 square-kilometre area of community forest in northern Mizoram. This would make the species “Endangered” as per criteria listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), they write in their study published in Phytokeys.

ough documentation, other aspects also need attention according to Gowda.

“Currently, teaching plant taxonomy ends with the description of a plant and no research follows. There’s no focus on the ecology of the species, or research to show the need for its conservation,” she says.

“That’s something we hope to focus on in the TrEE Lab at IISER Bhopal.”

A lot of research in India is also animaloriented and that needs to change too, she adds.

“When we talk of forests, we talk about the animals in them, never the plants. And when we do talk of plants, it’s only about agricultural crops or medicinal plants. We really need to increase awareness about the importance of wild plants.” (source: india.mongabay.com)

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