Farmers need options to take care of animals that are not producing milk. Or they will be forced to let them stray, to eat the plastic cities throw away and die. By banning meat we are literally taking away half the potential income the livestock owner possesses. It is stealing from the poor, nothing less….
Read More about Sunita Narain: Why I would not advocate vegetarianism
Countercurrents.org
From Countercurrents.org: Human cultural evolution can be regarded as an enormous success in many respects. However, thoughtful observers agree that civilization is entering a period of crisis. As all curves move exponentially upward: population, production, consumption, etc, one can observe signs of increasing environmental stress, while the existence of nuclear weapons threaten civilization with destruction….
Read More about Information theory pioneer John Scales Avery on the planet’s converging crisesDavid Korten writes that if don’t make a collective choice to heal the planet and build a fundamentally more equitable society, we’ll see intensifying competition for shrinking resources and habitable spaces. Activist Mary Robinson explains why climate change Is a threat to human rights and asks us to join the movement for worldwide climate justice….
Read More about The biggest refugee crisis since WWII is a sign of a planet in troubleYesterday, a local court convicted 31, and acquitted 117 of the 148 workers charged with the murder of an HR manager at Maruti-Suzuki’s Manesar plant five years ago. The verdict once again puts the spotlight on the extreme exploitation and structural violence that characterise Indian industry, described by G. Sampath in this unforgettable 2012 article….
Read More about Can India Inc. face the truth about the Manesar violence?This day a year ago, Honduran indigenous and environmental organizer and Goldman Environmental Prize winner Berta Cáceres was assassinated in her home. She and her associates had faced death threats for standing up to mining and dam projects that threatened to destroy their community. A tribute to her fighting spirit on her first death anniversary….
Read More about Tribute: Berta Cáceres, an outspoken voice for nature that was silencedDeepa Bhasthi writes in The Guardian: The illegal dumping of waste mixed with mass untreated sewage in Bangalore is creating a water crisis which threatens residents’ health–and is causing the city’s famous lakes to catch fire. This is the new story of the city, which some scientists believe will be “unliveable” in a few years….
Read More about City of burning lakes: experts fear Bangalore will be uninhabitable by 2025
We are coming into an era of huge uncertainty–climate change is a reality, resources are becoming more scarce and I this will eventually lead to armed conflict. While my partner and I are in the extremely fortunate position, I feel that it would be unfair of me to bring a child into a precarious future….
Read More about I want children – but my fears for the planet’s future fill me with doubt
In Kaziranga national park, rangers shoot people to protect rhinos. The park features in a new BBC investigation, which highlights some of the conflicts that characterise contemporary conservation, as the need to protect endangered species comes into contact with the lives and rights of people who live in and around the increasingly threatened national parks….
Read More about Kaziranga: The park that shoots people to protect rhinosThe New Yorker reports: Survivalism, the practice of preparing for the collapse of civilization, tends to evoke a certain picture: eg. the religious doomsayer. But in recent years survivalism has expanded to more affluent quarters, taking root in Silicon Valley and New York City, among technology executives, hedge-fund managers, and others in their economic cohort….
Read More about Some of the world’s wealthiest are preparing for the crackup of civilisation
Sea level rise has washed away more than 50% of Ghoramara island, Sunderbans
Daesung Lee
Manipadma Jena reports: An ActionAid report released last month warns of the devastating and increasing impact of climate change on women in South Asia, stating how “Young females from neighbouring Nepal and Bangladesh who migrate to India as well as internal migrants from rural areas moving to cities are increasingly vulnerable to abuse and trafficking.”…
Read More about Women bear the brunt of climate-forced migrationBill Laurance writes: An unprecedented spate of road building is happening now, with around 25 million kilometres of new paved roads expected by 2050. An ambitious new study that mapped all roads globally has found that roads have split the Earth’s land surface into 600,000 fragments, most of them too tiny to support significant wildlife….
Read More about The global road-building explosion is shattering nature
From The New York Times: …It is impossible to imagine a world without global connections: They have always existed, and no place has escaped their formative influence. But this does not mean that there is any inherent merit in interconnectedness, which has always been accompanied by violence, deepening inequalities and the large-scale destruction of communities….
Read More about Amitav Ghosh: What nutmeg can tell us about globalisation
G. Seetharaman reports: Activists say one of the biggest hurdles for FRA is that even states like Maharashtra, among the better performers, and Odisha are introducing policies which will help the forest department retain control of forest resources through joint forest management committees or similar bodies, which will dilute the powers of the gram sabha….
Read More about Why the Forest Rights Act is yet to achieve major milestones
Gautam Adani with Prime Minister Narendra Modi
Amit Bhardwaj reports: The Jharkhand Government wants thousands of farmers to give up their multi-crop fertile lands for the Adani power plant. The plant will sell its entire electricity produce to Bangladesh. “They’ve used 1932 land records to show that a majority of the land here is not being used for agriculture,” said Vidya Devi….
Read More about Adani Power Vs The People Of Jharkhand
Gabriel Popkin reports: To preserve a natural landscape, kick people out. This “guns and fences” paradigm of conservation relies on drastically restricting local people’s activities—or even displacing them altogether. Today, it has spread around the world, with disastrous consequences for communities. But in many cases, it may be misguided, argue a growing chorus of experts….
Read More about The best way to protect the world’s forests? Keep people in themWhen seven deaths have not stirred the government’s conscience, Rai is convinced that the resistance is futile. “The worst pain in the world is the pain of being displaced,” said Rai. “But the fact is neither political protests nor public demand can stop displacement. We’ll have to leave this village, our fields and our history.”…
Read More about The Jharkhand Model of Development: Resources for investors, bullets for villagersWe face awesome global environmental challenges. Climate change, food production, overpopulation, the decimation of other species, epidemic disease, acidification of the oceans. Together, they are a reminder that we are at the most dangerous moment in the development of humanity… Now, more than at any time in our history, our species needs to work together….
Read More about Stephen Hawking: This is the most dangerous time for our planet
From GRAIN.org: Powerful actors, driven by narrow economic interests rather than long term sustainability are concentrating the political power to determine how resources are to be used, by whom, and for what purposes… The Global Convergence of Land and Water Struggles is a response to these injustices by frontline communities from all over the world….
Read More about Voices from the global convergence of land and water struggles
Hydropower is a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions: a new study shows that the world’s hydroelectric dams are responsible for as much methane emissions as Canada. The study finds that methane, which is at least 34 times more potent than carbon dioxide, makes up 80% of the emissions from water reservoirs created by dams….
Read More about The hydropower paradox: is this energy as clean as it seems?
In her new book, The Burning Forest: India’s War In Bastar, anthropologist Nandini Sundar provides a harrowing narrative of the toll this ongoing conflict has taken on the lives of Bastar’s Adivasis. Sundar demonstrates how the institutions of democracy have failed to address the human tragedy in what has become one of India’s most militarized regions….
Read More about Nandini Sundar: Militarization of the imagination
