Conserve & Grow: The challenge is to think fresh

Environment and the idea of environmentalism — both face serious challenges in India today. The demands of a surging economy require natural resources to be used and exploited at an unprecedented rate. In a populous and poor country, these new demands on resources - land, water and what lies underneath - have aggravated the contests between different stakeholders. Villagers who want to hold on to their lands and water sources are pitted against industries that require raw material. Many of these contests are taking a violent turn. Expanding cities are eating into agrarian land. Industrial hubs are becoming public health nightmares.

The forest and environmental clearances given by the Union government in recent decades are an indicator of the rate at which resources are being consumed. In the past 30 years, about 1.6 lakh hectare of forest land has been diverted for mining. Of this, about 48,537ha was diverted in the 11th fiveyear Plan alone — 30% of the total forest land diverted for mining.

While policymakers face the challenge of ensuring sustainable development , the idea of environmentalism itself is also in a state of flux. The era when the poor could be squashed between demands of industrial growth and imported ideas of conservation is over. A changed polity today has greater space for the most vulnerable communities to argue, fight if required, and demand their own collective and individual rights. The environment cannot be protected in the name of the poor anymore. The green movement today needs to find a way to ensure that the environment is not exploited in the name of the poor either.

Then there is also the greater challenge that links nations and communities across the globe - climate change. The warming of the atmosphere threatens everybody and makes poorer people more vulnerable. Countries need to take collective action to reduce emissions from fossil fuel burning. But India and its environmental movement will have to ensure that these actions do not come at the cost of a better life for the poor.

The strains and stresses of rising and highly varying consumption levels are now visible on natural habitats as well as on the poor. For them, more than anyone else, a healthy environment is a prerequisite for survival and livelihood. Clearly, people, communities and corporate houses need to abandon the fallacious debate of growth versus environment ; those who can find ways to marry the two for the benefit of the less privileged are the environmentalists this era requires.

GREEN GO-AHEAD

In the 11th five-year Plan period, 276 thermal power plants of 2.2 lakh MW capacity, 203 steel plants of 132mn tonnes per annum capacity and 112 cement plants with capacity to produce an additional 202mn tonnes cement every year, have got environment clearance

8,734 projects have been granted forest clearance and 2 lakh hectares of forest land have been diverted

119 coal mining projects have got forest clearance during this period, diverting 31,500ha of forest land — the highest number cleared in any five-year Plan since 1981

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