Pesticides to kill locusts harm ecosystems, signature fauna
The danger of locust swarms has passed for now. For five months from March 2020, hundreds of field teams were deployed in India and Pakistan to kill locusts that swarmed…
[Commentary] Biodiversity talks also need to develop nationally determined commitments
The President of United Nations General Assembly, Tijjani Muhammad-Bande, is convening the United Nations Summit on Biodiversity on September 30, 2020. This is being held on the margins of the…
India needs massive increase in green finance for required climate action
India is struggling to lift millions out of poverty and is going to be hit harder than almost any other nation from increasing storms, heat waves, and floods, which together…
The precarious journey of Goa’s mining-affected and dependent people
Chandrasekhar Shirodkar, 48, returned from Saudi Arabia in the early 1990s. When he came back to Maem, a village in the north-eastern mining belt of India’s western state Goa, he…
Mega renewable energy park in Kutch could have potentially adverse environmental impact
Recently, a news report highlighted that the Gujarat government has plans to develop a 41,500-megawatt (MW) hybrid renewable energy park in Kutch. The state government has cleared the revenue department’s…
Kolar Gold fields: From fields of gold to a dust bowl
“The government has taken 40 precious years of my life, used me and left me to die when their work was completed,” rued 79-year-old K. Esavel, a resident of Karnataka's…
Why illegal mining in Aravallis should scare Delhi and its neighbours
In August 2020, the Supreme Court of India ordered the Haryana authorities to stop road construction in the ecologically sensitive zone of Aravalli hills. Its order came after a media…
Closer watch on vulnerable tribal groups in the Andamans in the face of COVID-19
Earlier this month, when 11 of the 56 surviving members of the Great Andamanese tribe in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands tested positive for coronavirus, it sent the officials of…
Is joint community ownership the way forward for mineral governance in India?
“Mining companies come to our villages and our forests to exploit the resources underneath and everyone in the value chain makes money. But it is the tribal community that bears…
Present versus past: Environmental threats can destroy Edakkal caves and their Stone Age carvings
Some 126 years after British police officer Fred Fawcett’s chance discovery of the famous Edakkal Caves and their ancient rock carvings in Wayanad district of Kerala, the mountain which houses…
