The World Meteorological Organization’s State of the Climate in Asia 2024 report warns that the region is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, driving more extreme weather and posing serious threats to lives, ecosystems, and economies. In 2024, Asia experienced its warmest or second warmest year on …
This year Orissa suffered one of its worst droughts as well. The drought gripped more than two-thirds of the state's districts. After the great famine of 1866, it was for the first time that drought of such a magnitude hit Orissa. It affected the lives of 11 mil-lion people. After …
The ghost of the 1999 super cyclone still haunts the people of Orissa. On October 18, 1999, a cyclone with a wind velocity of 200 km/hr hit the coastal district of Ganjam. It ripped through the district killing 300 people and destroying all standing crops. And while the state government …
THE debate on whether climate change causes calamities in Orissa rages on. But nobody denies that environmental degradation in the state has let loose a chain of problems. Massive deforestation in west Orissa is not only destroying the livelihood of local people but also silting up riverbeds causing floods in …
Chitta Majhi, a history student of Balugaon College, on the banks of Chilka, has grown up with the lake. During winter, Chitta used to play with migratory birds right in front of his house. "Sometimes I could find the migratory birds right inside my bedroom', he remem-bers. For his father, …
BHAGWAN SAHOO looks pensive and despon-dent. This 60-year-old farmer is trying hard to redefine his life. A farmer by heart, Bhagwan has decided to quit farming. His two sons have already aban-doned the village and him, in search of an alternate livelihood. The 1999 killer cyclone left Bhagwan with nothing. …
In Kashipur, starvation continues to stalk its residents. Nearly 50 people died after consum-ing ungus-ridden mango kernel till August. But the state government defended this say-ing that mango kernel is nutritious and the deaths are due to food poisoning. Kashipur epitomises the plight of Orissa perfectly. It shows how environmental …
Hope was the most precious commodity for drought-rava-ged Orissa a few months ago. So when the monsoon of 2001 reached the state on time, there was jubilation. But incessant rains for 40 days starting from the first week of July ebbed this jubila-tion. In its worst ever flood recorded in …
He loves to dabble with pumps. Fourteen-year-old Sukumal Dutta along with the other members of the community has undergone training as a mechanic for diesel pumpsets. With help from the NBTDP, the conventional diesel pump which used to lift water was modified to increase the overall efficiency, reduce cost and …
Our stock brokers can learn a few things about rising and falling prices from the Rabha tribe. Sheetin Rabha is a dynamic and wise women. Her group of 24 members decided to invest and took Rs 600 from their deposits and purchased 480 kg of rice. The price of paddy …
Devastating floods ruined Bhavesh Mandal's crops in the late 1960s. The hapless farmer had no option but to migrate to Mumbai and work as a masonry worker with no roof over his head. However, thanks to the North Bengal Terai Development Project ( nbtdp ), today Bhavesh is back in …
Water has suddenly become a favoured subject for seminars and conferences all over the world. A common trend in most of the discussions is to proceed from projections of demand to supply-side solutions in the form of ‘water resource development’ projects; estimate the massive investment funds needed; take note of …
people build castles in the air and homes on firm ground. But Abdul Hussain builds his castles on the shifting sands of the Brahmaputra bank. He has been living on an earthen embankment on the banks of Brahmaputra for the last 15 years. This embankment gets shifted every year as …
for the first time, in an unequivocal verdict, scientists have held human activities responsible for most of the warming of the Earth's atmosphere over the last 50 years. Latest assessment of scientific studies of climate change by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (ipcc) predicts that such actions will continue …
as a result of climate change, uk may have to bear the brunt of as many as twelve floods a year. This would be four times the annual average a century ago, and double the present annual average of six, declared the National Flood Warning Centre of the of the …
societal changes such as increase in human population have led to a steep rise in the costs of flood damages in the us . A study conducted by Roger Pielke Jr and Mary Downton of the National Centre for Atmospheric Research ( ncar ), Colorado, usa , states that even …
Rise in sea levels due to global warming threatens to drown at least 2,000 of the 17,000 Indonesian islands, according to Pelangi, an environmental group. Sutamihardja, head of the group and a member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change also warned that global warming could cause sea level to …
The Yellow River of China may soon dry up. The reasons behind this are drought, deforestation and mismanagement of water waste. "The situation has worsened significantly since the beginning of the 1980s,' says Cao Mingming, professor of environmental geography at Xibei University located in Xian city. Mingming believes that exploitative …
tornadoes, blizzards and floods are making the already miserable weather of Britain more unpredictable. Now, scientists are holding global warming responsible for the disasters, the most recent being the flash floods that ravaged many parts of the country. The weather crisis being faced by Britain is a result of mankind's …
british politicians are facing one disaster after another but the way they are facing them should be a lesson for the tribe that exists in India. As in our country, the high fuel prices have become a source of major contention and with fuel blockades being threatened there is panic …
Floods in Bangladesh have claimed the lives of more than 130 people and rendered more than two million people homeless. Over 1,100 km of roads and hundreds of buildings have been destroyed by the floods. Prime minister Sheikh Hasina has directed the army to take measures to flush out the …
