Aug 21, 2015 03:26 PM
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The cost of living is increasing, shooting up with every moment passed. Living is costly. The prices of basic necessities are rising. The technolgical edge comes at a cost. The malls. The pubs. Expensive indeed.
However, dying can be expensive too. We hear of farmers comitting suicide every other day; But has it ever tinkered upon our gray matter that dying is expensive. Yes dying is expensive, more so in ecological terms. Its is more a concerning fact.
How is that supposed to be?
More than 83 people die globally every minute. If all were buried, 50 acres of land would be taken up for burial grounds. Well real estate prices are shooting up, arent they? Expensive!
But more disturbing fact is that, as in Hindusim, burning pyres is the traditional way to do it, just the amount of wood required for the last rites to be performed is magnanimous. Assuming that 80 percent of the deaths occur in Hindu families, around 8 Hindus die every minute.
It costs about 300 kg of wood per dead body—one tree approximately. At the current rate of mortality it amounts to 8 trees per minute per dying Hindu. This amounts to 2400 Kgs of firewood for pyres every minute. That is a lot of biomass. But ‘traditions’, they say, die hard. So, it’s hardly surprising that electric cremation, the best-known alternative to pyres of precious firewood, has not found the kind of acceptance it should have.
For, in these ecologically-conscious times, it’s also a question of values and politics. In fact, of survival itself. So, ‘how can the dead be allowed to deplete the resources of the living?’, is much more than a moral poser now. The annual 24-billion-kg consumption of firewood, just for cremation is, therefore, no less than an unforgivable act of crime.
Agricultural expansion and Urbanisation
The other major causes of deforestation immediately after independence was agricultural expansion, often state-sponsored. In more recent times it is new policies and programmes of development; rapid industrialisation, urbanisation and growing consumerism that have resulted in the widescale destruction of the forests. What has been equally bad if not worse is that the development projects very insensitively alienated the communities living in the forests, depriving them of their basic sources of survival, forcing them to move away and in the process making them refugees in their own land.
Plywood mills
The profits made and the incentives offered by the administration encouraged the plywood mills to go in for substantial augmentation of their production capacities. With more and more increase in timber demand, supply proportionally increased reaping rich profits. And with government subsidaries offering a support, there was no stopping to the rampant tree felling.
Commercial Forestry
Another major factor contributing to change in the ecological forest cover and tree felling is commercial forestry. Commercial forestry was introduced and the process of conversion of natural forests into commercial plantations was started. Commercial plantations like teak, tea, spices and condiments etc demanded the natural forest cover to be compromised. The introduction of commercial forestry resulted in a conflict over natural resources and the ‘right’ of the people to use the resources became ‘privileges’.
There have been a number of commercial threats to the forests as well. This includes the conversion of forests into teak plantations, and the operations of the charcoal contractors, who in the past had been leased out the parts of the forest. Not only has all this resulted in the direct destruction of the forests, but government policies have also alienated the local people who no longer associate with the forests like they did in the past.
Deforestation is rampant in a nation like ours. Being a populous country, people have to be actually included at all levels in planning, decision making and implementation to make any program successful and that afforestation cannot be looked as a sectoral responsibility of the forestry sector. It is a process of social engineering. Any afforestation project will make a dent only when the underlying causes for deforestation are adequately addressed. Without paying attention to the causes of deforestation, afforestation projects cannot succeed.
Some steps which can serve as a ray of hope to replenish the forest covers:
Any implemented program can be truly sucessful if the local population take an initiative. Its not just government who is responsible, but it is for each and every living soul to be morally and dutifully responsible for the deed.
Rural India is at the base of the pyramid of our developing India, in terms of manpower as wells as resources. Involving rural India in afforestation program can be a stepping stone towards success.
Wooden carpentry needs to be swapped away from domestic India.
Synthetic alternatives and metallic substitutes are equally good and durable, if not better. More importantly, eco friendly.
Its high time that LPG reaches rural India. Biogas offers a good alternative. But still majority of India cooks on firewoods. This needs a drastic restructuring. LPG stations needs to be supplying rural India to save the green. If government can't copeup with these demands, private sector are eager to have their stake in this sector as well.
Charcoal industry no longer need to exist. They must cease at the moment. There are so many natural and inexhaustible energy resources. Solar energy is one of them. Harnessing solar energy and its redirection for domestic and industrial purposes will contribue a lot towards conserving traditional and exhaustible resourses like firewoods and charcoal. Commercial forestry is welcome, but not at the cost of depletion of natural forest cover. What sense does it make to chop down evergreen forests for tea plantations. It not only depletes the forest cover, but also drastically disturbs the food chain and ecological chain.
Restructure the power projects and mining industry to coexist in a harmonious way with the environment.
Cease all the government subsidaries to the plywood and timber industry.
In a predominantly agrarian nation like ours, agriculture is our bread and butter. To meet the growing demands of the population, the output has to increase, but instead of trying to increase the hectares and acres of land under cultivation, try to increase the productivity of the land already under cultivation. Expand cultivation to the fertile soils of the deltas and river banks.
Implementation of effective and irrigation programs. Bhakra-Nangal project and the Narmada project with Sardar sarovar dam justify the inputs when weighed against outputs it has provided. Fertile soil and fertilizers supply.
Urbaniszation is good for Indian economy. More and more rural India is getting under the urban shade, but spare the forests. With a growing economy and infrastructure, it would be an absolute calamity to ignore the environment. When the tricolour unfurls, we see that the green is an inseparable part of it. Let it always be associated with the colours of development.
The onus lies on We. Us. Ourselves. Back to Chipko Aandolan!
