Good Food is First Food. It is not junk food. It is the food that connects nature and nutrition with livelihoods. This food is good for our health; it comes from the rich biodiversity of our regions; it provides employment to people. Most importantly, cooking and eating give us pleasure. …
THE REFUSAL of the Union railway ministry and the Goa administration to participate in the Kamla Chowdhury committee, set up by the Union ministry of environment and forests to review the Konkan railway project, has rendered the work of the committee both difficult and meaningless. The railway ministry, in fact, …
SCIENTISTS are now looking for a defective gene that leads to over-production of uric acid, a condition that may lead to gout-related disorders and kidney complaints. Recent research shows that gout is not confined to overweight, elderly people with a penchant for alcohol. Children can also develop gout and kidney …
IN TIBET, solar energy is being used increasingly to heat homes, cook food, run television sets, milk cows, shear sheep and, of course, provide light. Tibet gets 3,000 hours of sunshine each year, compared with New Delhi, which gets 2,525 hours annually. In an area slightly in excess of one …
FISH TRADERS of Andhra Pradesh have a good market in far away Assam. Even after paying transportation charges of upto Rs 8 per kg of fish taken to Assam, the traders get to put away a tidy sum for themselves. The irony is that Assam itself abounds in wetlands, but …
IN A RADICAL departure from earlier policy, the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) will now look beyond the Hindu Kush region and establish links to study other mountain regions of the world. This is in line with its strategic plan for the 1990s, titled "Towards 2000", which also …
Drip irrigation brought honours and money to Javerilal Kapurchand Kanaria of Nashik district when he ventured out of his cloth business and began growing pomegranates, each weighing more than a kg. Two years after Kanaria started his scientific farming in Taharabad, his balance-sheet -- Rs 6 lakh annually from a …
Imperial Chemical Industries of England and Calgene of the USA are at war over who owns the patent rights to a "fresh" tomato. Both companies have developed a genetically improved, longer-lasting, non-squishy tomato that retains its flavour and firmness longer. Each pinpointed the enzyme that causes tomatoes to rot and …
INDUSTRIAL towns with a high growth and, therefore, high pollution potential will come in for special attention from the Punjab Pollution Control Board, under a new initiative to deal with pollution in the state. Amritsar, Batala, Gobindgarh Mandi, Jalandhar, Khanna, Ludhiana, Nangla and Phagwara have already been earmarked by the …
PEOPLE who want to put their money in teakwood plantation schemes that look attractive on the surface should think twice, advises D N Tiwari, director general of the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education. He also cautions investors against corporate plantations which promise to raise teakwood and yield high …
TIMBER worth crores of rupees is being stolen from the UP forests. Trees are cut either without permission or with the connivance of those in authority. Timber worth Rs 30 lakh was seized in a single seizure recently, reflecting the magnitude of the problem, which is complicated further by terrorist …
AND NOW, it's the turn of the Orissa Maritime and Chilka Area Development Authority (OMCAD). OMCAD has stepped into the Chilka leasing controversy with an advertisement for leasing three plots around the Chilka lake for prawn culture units. While those fighting against the Tata project have been quick to take …
AT THE rate at which the world's forests are disappearing, it would appear that the price for human development is the destruction of forests. This is true wherever civilisations have risen and flourished, observes author and amateur explorer John Perlin, in his new book A Forest Journey, brought out by …
IF SO-CALLED ecological subsidies were halted in India, the true cost of paper would double immediately and the price of thermal power would soar an electrifying 60 per cent. These are the findings in a study __ the first of its kind in India -- sponsored by the Administrative Staff …
TECHNOLOGY is opening up the world of computers to the blind, everyday activity such as feeding oneself to the spastic and movement to the physically handicapped. A number of government and research organisations are investing ingenuity, time and funds in developing aids for the handicapped. But commercial organisations are lagging …
THE EARTH summiteers who assembled at Rio in June this year have gone back to their respective countries. The hard preparatory work, the almost endless discussions to reach a consensus and the excitement of an earth summit are all over. One talks of a lull before a storm; but there …
WHEN SLIGHTLY built Saif Ali, 22, looks out from his home in Choti Nahar, on the outskirts of Pathankot on the highway to Gurdaspur, he sees the blue-grey hills of the Dhauladhar range in the distance. It's not just physical distance that separates him from the mountains, it's a whole …
That concerned citizens have the right to approach the courts on matters of social justice and that India's constitution, by implication, guarantees ecological justice are indeed ideas that have done India's judiciary proud. They have greatly strengthened democracy in the country and, over the years, public interest litigation has become …
In this issue, we carry two reports: One on the subject of human rights suppression and environmental degradation, and the other on trade bans against environmentally harmful products. Both trade and human rights are being used today as sticks to beat the South. Northern NGOs have repeatedly raised these issues …
HAVING an attractive, alliterative title is a prerequisite for popular books today, but it is Arthur Bonner"s subtitle that is seriously misleading. Averting the Apocalypse is not about "social movements in India today". Rather, it is about a particular subset of activists connected with them -- the educated upper-middle class, …
The pollen so sharp that the wind sneezed, its belly so speckled with rashes that it turned visible. The way the fish walked up the beaches you'd think they had turned amphibian. The fisherfolk came out, hollering; as the women tenderly pushed them back in the sea saying "they are …
