Conflict/Dispossession
Gladson Dungdung writes: With the CAMPA bill being passed, the forest department has regained its lost hegemonic power over Adivasis. Many past and present instances suggest that the CAMPA amounts to the return of a British Raj-like regime to the forest, aggravating resource based conflict and the enmity between the State and forest dwelling communities….
Read More about CAMPA: The return of British Raj to the forests
Representational pic
CLIMATE CRISIS
Chelsea Harvey reports: It’s increasingly clear that the consequences of climate change won’t stop at just heatwaves and sea level rise. A new study suggests that violence, war and other forms of human conflict may be driven or worsened by the effects of climate change — specifically in countries with high levels of ethnic divides….
Read More about How climate disasters can drive violent conflict around the world
Consumerism/Lifestyle
C.P. Chandrasekhar writes: Even the kind of economic growth that liberalisation actually delivered is proving unsustainable. So, the belief that growth would remain high for years to come, delivering benefits even to those at the bottom of the income pyramid and those steeped in poverty and deprivation, has now revealed itself to be a myth….
Read More about 25 years of ‘economic reforms’: The myth of growth
Conflict/Dispossession
Campaign for Survival and Dignity release: The Rajya Sabha has passed the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Bill, 2016. This Bill essentially gives carte blanche to forest officials to spend gigantic amounts of money (over Rs. 40,000 crores) without any accountability to the people whose forests, lands and lives will be damaged or destroyed by their activities….
Read More about A black day for the rights of millions – Rajya Sabha passes Afforestation Bill
Development/Growth
National Geographic reports: Around the world, alarms are being sounded about groundwater depletion. Underground water is being pumped so aggressively globally that land is sinking, civil wars are being waged, and agriculture is being transformed. According to scientist Jay Famiglietti, the areas where aquifiers are under the greatest threat are also the most heavily populated….
Read More about What you need to know about the world’s water warsALTERNATIVES
At the beginning of the Edo period (1603-1868), Japan faced ecological collapse from deforestation, erosion and watershed damage. New conservation practices were introduced in response to this crisis which brought about a sustainable interaction between nature and humans. Current anxieties about the state of the world are today driving renewed interest in the Edo experience….
Read More about In the world’s biggest city, the past offers lessons for surviving the future
Conflict/Dispossession
In 2008, GRAIN exposed how a new wave of land grabbing was sweeping the planet in the name of addressing the global food and financial crises. Their new report shows that the global farmland grab is far from over. Rather, it’s in many ways deepening, expanding to new frontiers and intensifying conflict around the world….
Read More about The global farm land grab in 2016: How big, how bad?
Development/Growth
The de-greening of India’s cities is creating water-starved heat-islands. Bangalore may be India’s most drastic example, but the short-sighted assault on greenery is nationwide. Projections show that in 2030, Kolkata’s vegetation cover will be just 3.37% (from 34% in 1980), Ahmedabad’s 3% (from 37% in 1990) and Bangalore’s 14% by 2020 (from 46% in 1992)….
Read More about The dying gulmohars of Bangalore and urban India’s forbidding future
CLIMATE CRISIS
Ayesha Banerjee reports: “Climate change’s not something which will happen in the future. It’s happening right now. April 2016 was one of the hottest months on record.” The warning comes from climate change researcher Mihir Mathur, at TERI in Delhi, who is picking up danger signals from planet earth and wants to mitigate the impact….
Read More about Are you too young to be worried about climate change?Development/Growth
Conventional economic analysts argue that achieving adequate human development indicators require a country’s economy has to grow continuously at an appreciable rate; but, a densely populated and resource-constrained society such as ours cannot afford to ignore the implications of high energy and material consumption (which will be a consequence of high growth of the economy)….
Read More about Can India afford an economy obsessed with GDP growth rate?Development/Growth
Chris Martenson writes: The main issue is simple: putting in steel reinforcing bars lowers the cost and weight of installing reinforced concrete, but at the severe expense of reducing its lifespan. In other words, literally everything you see today that’s made of concrete will need to be replaced within a hundred years of its installation….
Read More about How industrial civilisation is (literally) built on a foundation with an expiry dateConserve/Resist
This paper by multiple authors – published in the International Journal of the Commons – won the journal’s Ostrom Memorial Award for Most Innovative Paper of the Year. The authors use a unique longitudinal dataset of forest policy in 100 municipalities in Bolivia to examine the relationships between citizen pressures and economic incentives on forest policy….
Read More about What incentivises local forest conservation efforts?
Food/Farming
Colin Todhunter writes: With Modi now at the helm, the government is doing the bidding of global biotech companies and is currently trying to push through herbicide-tolerant GM mustard based on fraudulent tests and ‘regulatory delinquency‘, which will not only open the door to GM crops but will boost the sales of Bayer’s glufinosate herbicide….
Read More about Modi and agribusiness: Doing business or corporate imperialism?Food/Farming
Sayantan Bera reports: The sorry state of India’s farm movement is inextricably linked to the non-viability of farming now, said Vijay Jawandhia, a farmer leader from Wardha in Maharashtra. “Land holdings have become smaller and farmers everywhere are struggling to run a family and survive. Where is the time or resource to invest in a movement?”…
Read More about Why rural distress is not triggering organised farmer unrestConflict/Dispossession
Floods are not a new thing in Bihar, a state in the lap of these flood plains. Around the time of India’s independence, the state started caging its rivers with embankments. In this video, Dinesh Mishra explains why Bihar is so vulnerable to flooding and more importantly, why embankments have caused more harm than good….
Read More about Video: Bihar’s great walls of destruction
IISc
Development/Growth
Recent research by IISc reveals startling numbers on Bangalore’s reckless urbanization and its consequences: during 1973–2016 (1005% concretization or increase of paved surface) has had a telling influence on the natural resources, such as decline in green spaces (88% decline in vegetation), wetlands (79% decline), higher air pollutants and a sharp decline in groundwater table….
Read More about Red alert: India’s technology capital headed for system failure
ALTERNATIVES
Broroti Roy writes that in India, many are reluctant to use the term ‘degrowth’ because growth is seen as the only way to get rid of poverty. However, there are many grassroots initiatives emerging here, too, which follow the same principles of respecting the planet’s limits and pursuing the core values of equity and justice….
Read More about Bookshelf: Degrowth – A Vocabulary for a New Era
Morvarid Fernandez
ALTERNATIVES
Perhaps it’s time to reconsider the one-size-fits-all approach of centralised infrastructure and instead pursue a suite of solutions tailored to local needs. Could it be possible to have water systems that have no adverse impact on the environment? Such a transformation will require new technology but also new ways for people to interact with water….
Read More about How to achieve sustainable clean water for everyoneDevelopment/Growth
Irfan Syed writes: After it finished reclaiming land from water and then claiming the air (high-rises), the city of Mumbai, being a financial, marketing, and glamour capital and therefore having ceaseless immigration, has been devouring land, like a super-starved T-Rex. After eating up most of legit land, it’s been turning its attention to… the forest….
Read More about It’s raining big cats on dogged, destructive development
Bloomberg
Digests/Specials
Is ‘crony capitalism’ behind Rajan’s impending exit? RBI has been cracking the whip on major banks, collectively saddled with Rs 5,00,000 crore of bad loans. The banks in turn started forcing big debtors–including Reliance, Essar and Adani-to sell prized assets to repay debts. The numbers in this May 8 report in The Hindu speak volumes….
Read More about Corporate debt crackdown: Is it what pushed Raghuram Rajan out?
