ALTERNATIVES
From The Indian Express: Greenhouse gas emissions from solid waste disposal by India increased at the rate of 3.1% per annum between 2000 and 2010, and by China at 4.6% per cent between 2005 and 2012. In both cases it is likely that the figures are underestimated, since they don’t consider emissions from waste transportation….
Read More about What urban waste has to do with global warming
ALTERNATIVES
In this informative book, the author, Dr. Ashok Kundapur, who has had the privilege of contributing scholarly articles to Enclyclopedia of Life Support System (EOLSS) of UNESCO and Wikia of Solar Cooker International, has distilled his experience of 35 years, to cover over 260 designs of solar cookers, in full color, designed around the World….
Read More about Bookshelf: A Treatise On Solar Cookers by Ashok Kundapur
Conflict/Dispossession
From CNet/Future of Life Institute: Autonomous weapons use Artificial Intelligence to select and engage targets without human intervention. Now, a think tank backed by scientist Stephen Hawking and entrepreneur Elon Musk, among others, offers a graphic warning against machines that decide whom to kill. This fictional video underscores how seriously these experts view the issue….
Read More about Slaughterbots: How autonomous weapons endanger our future
Conserve/Resist
Dhrubajyoti Ghosh, one of India’s most courageous and persevering environmentalists, is no more. Here’s a tribute to Ghosh, best known for his campaign to save East Kolkata’s wetlands and its fisher and farming communities from the city’s real estate mafia. Also included, a video where he explains the concepts of cognitive apartheid and positive footprint….
Read More about Obituary: Dhrubajyoti Ghosh, intrepid defender of Kolkata’s wetlands
Conserve/Resist
From BBC: Cape Town is in the unenviable situation of being the first major city in the modern era to face the threat of running out of drinking water. But Cape Town is just the tip of the iceberg. Here are the 11 other cities worldwide that are most likely to run out of water….
Read More about Cape Town is running out of water. Guess who’s next?
ALTERNATIVES
A remarkable, first-ever collection of essays on India’s future, by a diverse set of authors – activists, researchers, media practitioners – those who have influenced policies and those working at the grassroots. It presents scenarios of an India that is politically and socially egalitarian, radically democratic, ecologically sustainable and economically equitable, and socio-culturally diverse and harmonious….
Read More about Bookshelf: Alternative Futures: India Unshackled
ALTERNATIVES
Daniel O’Neill writes: If everyone on Earth were to lead a good life within our planet’s sustainability limits, the level of resources used to meet basic needs would have to be reduced by a factor of two to six times. These are the sobering findings of our research, recently published in the journal Nature Sustainability….
Read More about Is it possible for everyone to live a good life within our planet’s limits?
Conflict/Dispossession
Atul Sood writes: Why are we not talking about the facts on the ground amidst the cacophonic discourse of the success of the Gujarat model? The need to impose Section 144 every time the Vibrant Gujarat Submit is organized symbolizes one pillar of ‘managing’ support for the model. The cultural narrative is the other pillar….
Read More about The ‘Gujarat Development Model’ rests on the twin pillars of authoritarianism and divisive politics
Conflict/Dispossession
“Is western civilisation on the brink of collapse?” the lead article in this week’s New Scientist asks. It’s a good question, but it seems too narrow. These pathologies are not confined to “the west”. The rise of demagoguery (and the pursuit of simplistic solutions to complex problems) is everywhere apparent. Environmental breakdown is accelerating worldwide….
Read More about George Monbiot: Is this the end of civilisation? We could take a different path
ALTERNATIVES
Minhaj Ameen writes: Project Puchki has impacted 70,000 students in 1600 schools across 6 Indian States through 80 interns. It is our to take Project Puchki to all rural households of India and create awareness amongst millions of students who are currently outside the gambit of fundamental education on environmental sustainability, sanitation and menstrual hygiene….
Read More about Project Puchki: Raising awareness on sustainable living and menstrual hygiene
ALTERNATIVES
From Change.org: India’s National Mineral Policy is open till Feb 9, 2018 for public comments. Minerals are a shared inheritance. The present mining system in India is leading to enormous losses of our mineral wealth, with only a few cronies benefiting. This must stop. Hence we are sending the representation to the Ministry of Mines….
Read More about Petition: Safeguard our minerals, our children’s inheritance, from theft
Development/Growth
We know that economies need to grow, or they collapse. The wage disparity that high-wage countries have been experiencing in recent years is evidence that the world economy is already reaching energy limits. There are no longer enough jobs that pay well to go around. Any drop in energy supply will likely worsen the situation….
Read More about Gail Tverberg: Nine reasons why globalisation can’t be permanent
Atulya Bingham
ALTERNATIVES
Ludwig Appeltans is an experienced permaculture teacher who has lived in the forest for four years. He runs the Earth Ways permaculture project, aiming to reconnect people, land and nature. Here, he is in conversation with Atulya Bingham, an earth building practitioner who has lived close to nature for many years in her native Turkey….
Read More about Atulya Bingham: The forest man
Medha Patkar campaigning for the Aam Aadmi Party in Mumbai
Joe Athialy
ALTERNATIVES
From The Transnational Institute: Women everywhere are leading struggles against corporate crimes and defending their communities and the dignity of all people, risking their lives in the process. To introduce our 2018 report on counter-power, we interviewed three women activists who have displayed incredible courage, determination and creativity to confront corporate power and state violence….
Read More about Three interviews: Medha Patkar, Bertha Zúñiga Cáceres and Nonhle Mbuthuma
Saravanakumar/Icon Films Ltd.
Conserve/Resist
A tribute to Romulus Whitaker, recently awarded the Padma Shri, among India’s highest civilian honours. Here, the acclaimed herpetologist talks about his decades of work with reptiles which led to setting up of six pioneering institutions including the famous Madras Crocodile Bank, apart from giving snakes and reptiles a positive place in the Indian public’s mind….
Read More about A tribute to Romulus Whitaker, the ‘Snake man of India’
ALTERNATIVES
Richard Heinberg writes: Many problems are converging at once because society is a complex system, and the challenges we have been discussing are aspects of a systemic crisis. A useful way to frame an integrated understanding of the 21st century survival challenge is this: we humans have overshot Earth’s long-term carrying capacity for our species….
Read More about Why we can no longer shrink from the most urgent conversation on the planet
ALTERNATIVES
“The idea of India faces an unprecedented challenge. Preventing irreversible damage to the Republic of India, as we have known it, is the most pressing political task of our times, our yugadharma.” So begins Yogendra Yadav’s penetrating analysis of India under the Narendra Modi regime. Essential reading on the 69th anniversary of the Republic’s founding….
Read More about Yogendra Yadav: What is to be done?
Development/Growth
India’s income inequality in 2017 may be worse than what it was during the British Raj. According to a new paper titled ‘Indian income inequality, 1922-2014: From British Raj to Billionaire Raj?’ penned by renowned economists Thomas Piketty and Lucas Chancel, India witnessed a sharp rise in the incomes of top 1 per cent post 1980s….
Read More about British Raj to Billionaire Raj: India’s inequality is now worse than in 1922
ALTERNATIVES
Ursula K. Le Guin, legendary American sci-fi author and creator of the classic ‘Earthsea’ series, died on January 22. She was 88. In this tribute, we present a video of her talk on “Transformation Without Apocalypse: How to Live Well on an Altered Planet”, as well as her article on ‘the future of the Left’….
Read More about R.I.P. Ursula Le Guin, visionary science-fiction writer
