environment

Environment and You

This is my story, my plea and our crisis. Pay heed now or face immeasurable consequences in future. I am sure you understand that it is the future, which matters. Past is past and present is only a moment and all of you will live more in the future. Hear me; understand me and coexist with me. I am the environment. I surround and affect you the people in all respects, the air you breathe, the water you consume and the light you use are only a part of me (environment). Your actions affect me in myriad ways. It is you and you only who affects me by your activities. Everytime you drive a car or use electricity generated from coal-fired plants or heat your homes with oil or natural gas, you release CO₂ and other heat trapping gases into the air which leads to the Greenhouse Effect and Global warming. The effects of which include increase in average surface temperature, decrease in snow cover and ice, retreat of glaciers, rise in global average sea level and increase in ocean water temperatures. The consequences of this observed physical and ecological changes include extreme precipitation, decline in some plant and animal species, earlier flowering of trees, earlier emergence of insects and earlier egg laying in birds. Climate sensitive diseases shall increase as a direct consequence of global warming. Ozone concentration in the lower atmosphere has drastically increased respiratory ailments, as well as vascular diseases. Melting of Artic ice is the most serious threat, which now looms ahead for you to tackle. I would advise you to think before you get lured into buying products attractively packaged by Aishwarya Rai. Probably the lipsticks and jewellery she promotes may be the least harmful but still they add to environmental pressures.

Your continued desire for industrialization and unrestrained use of natural resources damages me and I react by unleashing floods in one place, droughts in other and locust clouds in some other place. One such locust cloud is now on the way to Yemen and may affect India and Pakistan. When the pressure on me continues I command the glaciers and the polar ice fields to melt. These actions of mine cause untold misery and suffering to you but I am helpless. I am forced to react over a period of time and the results are invariably disastrous. It is your actions that trigger off premature changes in me. Why cannot you understand this and protect me? Is it your shortsightedness or greed for immediate gains?

I consist of various elements and the relationships between these elements are delicate and symbiotic. Every element of mine is linked to the other and any disturbance caused to one element can spoil my entire balance. To illustrate, deforestation results in the topsoil vanishing and declining agricultural yields that makes you use artificial fertilizers to increase your yield, but it also fails as the soil stops reacting over a period of time. I will tell you through examples, how deforestation can cause misery to your future generation. The present generation may get hard cash by cutting and selling the deadwood, but the coming generation pays the price. India has biological diversity, without parallel in the world. But this biodiversity is being threatened by logging and encroachment in forest areas. For example the impact of the Tsunami would have been far less devastating, if the mangrove swamps had been left untouched in Cuddalore area. So would the impact of the super cyclone in Orissa a few years ago. Deforestation on the slopes of the Konkan railway has resulted in land slides often blocking the rail traffic, similarly Chandigarh –Shimla highway has the same problem. The mountain slopes have been denuded of trees, which stop the rocks from rolling downward. The poor and landless enter the forest area and resort to deforestation for getting agricultural land. The pressure of population shows through over utilization of my resources and eventually on me. Over grazing, deforestation and over exploitation of the resources to fuel the present only makes your future dim. The continuous depletion of Amazon rain forest will increase the world’s temperature by 6-7 degrees. The destruction of this forest is going on and more than 10 % of the vast area has been deforested, causing infertility in the land, reducing ability to absorb CO₂, besides causing several species of plant and animal life to disappear forever.

Yes, I do agree that development is necessary but please do not ignore my presence.

“Water, water everywhere not a drop to drink.” Ouch! It hurts me to see this pathetic condition of many of the rivers across the world including India. You dump all your untreated industrial waste such as chemical fertilizers, pesticides, detergents etc, sludge, and other toxics into my rivers making the water unpalatable and leading to the disappearance of aquatic life. “Isn’t it ironical that you call Ganges, a holy river and still allow untreated wastes to flow into it and eventually playing with your own lives?” The problem of Ganga does not end here; the other problem faced by it is the melting of the glacier Gangotri at an alarmingly high rate. This thought makes me feel petrified as to what will be the future of Ganga?

I’ll tell about another river being made waste by human tinkering and short sightedness. Tirupur is the textile hub of South India. While money may be in plenty there, but the price paid for such earnings is the death of a river, namely Noyyal, a tributary of river Cauvery. The city is located upstream and the waters of this river had been use for its dyeing industries. Effluents are discharged directly into the river without any treatment killing all aquatic life. The dam downstream had accumulated all this polluted water and caused extensive degradation to the land on either side upto three kilometers which has affected the groundwater adversely due to toxic wastes, in turn affecting agriculture leading to debilating diseases. Coum River flowing through the heart of Chennai is another example of a river being converted into an open sewer, by negligence and shortsighted policies of those who govern us. Similar problems are seen in areas wherever leather-tanning industries have mushroomed in Tamil Nadu.

Wildlife plays an integral role in the ecological balance delicately crafted by nature. Your activities have led to the wiping out of several species of animals. In India, over half of the natural forests have been cut and animal life destroyed. At the turn of the century, there were over a lakh tigers in the wild, but now only 1500 tigers in the wild. Today you name an animal and you will know that they are either extinct or endangered. The animals too have right to live and grow, but overwhelming pressure of your ever increasing population, poaching and exotic belief in the so called medicinal value of a tiger claw or Rhino horn and elephant teeth has lead to it being hunted to near extinction. It beats me as to why an educated person like you will assume that a tiger’s claw will make you as brave as a tiger. Your constant intrusion in the quest of industrial development and mining activities in forest areas have resulted in constricting the place used for ages by animals. Cases of wild animals entering towns/populated areas are on a high with recent cases in Nashik, Jammu and Rajkhot, where leopards have entered towns and were mercilessly slaughtered by uneducated mobs in the presence of your supine police force. Increased encroachment by landless people in forest areas of Assam and Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal have brought your conflict with elephants to a situation where the elephant is being brutally killed by using electric shocks and traps. When the elephant is placed in such situations, the poor animal reacts and becomes violent. Corridors for elephants to pass by and core zones where there is no disturbance requires to be provided, but since elephants have no votes, they are left to die in the most painful manner by electrocution or native gunshots. The Police and the Forest department does nothing to save these so called “protected species”. The condition in African nations is also no different. The huge herds of animals, which used to be seen earlier, have all disappeared over the years. Unrest, lawlessness and illegal sale of ivory and animal skins have lead to the large-scale slaughter of animals in Africa. Only a few protected reserves remain where animals are safe and have become a source of revenue to the Government. In one province of China, it was decided to wipe out the sparrow population as somebody felt that they were consuming the grains, which were being cultivated, this resulted in sudden increase in insect population, which lead to plant diseases. Indiscriminate use of insecticides and pesticides to control pests in India led to a decline in the vulture population and built in immunity in the insect population they were meant to destroy. This lead to excessive use of chemicals to control and eradicate the pests which finally lead to land degradation and despoiling of ground water. Vultures are natural scavengers and their decline/disappearance spoke volumes about my degradation. Your greed has forever got the better of you and has resulted in depleting the oceans of the aquatic wealth by over fishing. Turtles, sharks and other predators have dwindled, because their main source of food has disappeared. 70% of the world’s marine stocks are fully exploited, over-exploited or depleted.

All these examples speak about the immense damage you have caused me. You cannot tinker with me and still avoid paying the price for it. You have been blessed with the ability and foresight to run the world in a proper manner. Educated bold decisions, which eschew immediate and short-term gains, are required to be taken to overcome my degraded state. Decisions are required to be taken to save me and thereby yourself and your future generations. Floods in one part and droughts in another part of the country, virulent diseases of new strains and unusual natural occurrences are a clear warning “act now or perish”. You cannot reverse the damage you have caused me, but can help me stabilize by using your intelligence in a cost-effective manner:

>Increase in energy efficiency standards and use of renewable sources of energy viz-solar power and wind energy.

>Decrease usage of coal, oil and firewood by developing substitutes like ethanol-based fuel.

>Protect and restore the biodiversity of forests and wild life.

>Use energy efficient and power saving appliances

>Use your mega bucks to install pollution treatment plants as a measure of your social responsibility.

>Avoid using plastics and polythene bags.

>Recycle and renew natural resources.

The moral of the story is that the time has come for you to take appropriate actions to protect me. The clock is ticking remorselessly and brooks no further delay. Every time you cut a tree and dump rubbish in a river you are moving closer towards a living hell. There is much for you to do today in order to protect your tomorrow. While there are gaps in understanding me, there is no longer the scope for “wait and see” stance. But when the change is too drastic, then my reaction is unpredictable and can cause havoc in your lives. The scenario arising from uncontrolled exploitation of nature without any checks and balances and consumerist society has lead the world to a state of disaster from which there can be no recovery. Come let both of us put our hands together to make the earth of ours

“LIVING PARADISE”

.