The National Biodiversity Authority has released a new set of rules to manage sharing of benefits generated through the use of biological resources. The Biological Diversity (Access to biological Resources and Knowledge Associated thereto and Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits) Regulation 2025 was approved by the Central government and …
About 89 per cent of the Vietnamese population consists of lowland Kinhs and the Muong people, who occupy the two agricultural deltas of the Red River and the Mekong river, besides the narrow coastal strip. The remaining 11 per cent consists of ethnic minorities, most of whom live in the …
Vietnam has an Association of Herbal Traditional Doctors with a nationwide membership of about 20,000, which is recognised by the government. But the association is starved of funds. These traditional doctors often offer their services free and are usually very poor. Berit Richter, a Danish activist working in Hanoi, is …
DUNGLENA AIZAWAL Almost every house in Aizawl, the capital of Mizoram, has developed its independent water supply system to counter the acute scarcity of water. Water is harvested as it falls literally from the rooftop. Rainfall is rarely small in quantity in the hilltop town of Aizawl. But over the …
Indigenous is the byword in the water harvesting techniques followed in India's northeast. In Meghalaya, an intricate network of bamboo pipes is used to irrigate betel leaf or black pepper crops in rocky areas where no channels can be built, a practice which has been raised to a sublime level. …
granny often knows best. Whenever there was a sore throat or a toothache we went to her and grandma obligingly pulled out a potion from her treasure trove of remedies. Many of them even worked. Perhaps the time has now come to go back to grandma for some other solutions. …
gondwanaland: supercontinent in geological history, of which India was a part. Gondwana ('Forest of the Gonds'): land of the Gond tribals and their powerful empire. A historic region which straddles the four states of Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Orissa. And famed for its traditional water harvesting structures. However, …
While a kata was a relatively big structure, there were several smaller systems like bandhs and mundas built all over western Orissa. A bandh is a four-sided tank excavated below the kata , from which it derives its water by percolation. Normally used for drinking purposes only, bandhs are invariably
"Development of modern, centralised system of irrigation is the main reason. Everywhere in the command area of the Hirakud dam, these structures lie defunct today,' says R S Rao, reader, department of economics, University of Sambalpur. His views are echoed in the villages. "When we get water, though not so …
The total area of Chittor fort is about 500 hectares (ha). The average depth of the reservoirs is about two metres, and with the total area of all reservoirs inside the fort being roughly 200 ha, they can owe about four billion litres (l) of water. Total rainwater that can …
Ranthambhore has five large water bodies - Jangali talab, Suksagar talab, Kalasagar, Padmala talab and Renee haud. There is also one perennial spring known as Gupt Ganga. All the talabs have a natural catchment. The biggest is the Jangali talab, Its bund (dam or embankment) is built in such a …
JODHPUR was founded in AD 1495. While selecting a site for locating the city, its builders must have given serious thought to its water potential and strategic situation. The Chonka- Daijar plateau, an important physical feature of this region, serves as a water catchment for 50 functional surface water bodies …
In 1985, Jodhpur experienced one of its worst droughts of the century. The city was on the verge of evacuation while its numerous baoris, instruments of its traditional self-sufficiency in water, lay neglected. The crisis served to bring forth a popular response. The Chand and Jalap baoris were cleaned up …
Wide variations exist in the annual sediment deposition under different physiographic settings. Nadis situated in older alluvial plains have the highest sedimentation rate, whereas those in the younger alluvial plains have the least. To take care of the capacity reduction of a nadi caused by sedimentation, villagers carry out dredging …
The present Water requirement of Jodhpur (estimated population in 1991: 900,000) it 27 million gallons per day (mgpd). The city gets 22.4 mgpd. Surface water reservoirs account for 55-60 per cent of the water supply. The major reservoirs, Jawai and Hemavas. in addition to supplying water to Jodhpur, also serve …
Bhawar Singh from Sindhi Colony in Jodhpur had drilled a borewell in the late '80s with the sole intention of selling water. Charging Rs 10 on an average for filling one tractor with water, this is his only source of income today. Since 1980-81, water has turned into a scarce, …
KIKRUMA is a nondescript village in India's remote northeast, inhabited by the Chakhesang tribals. Located at an altitude of 1,270 metres (m), 13 km from Pfutsero town in Phek district of Nagaland, the village comes under the town's rain-shadow. The entire village is situated on a flat ridge bounded by …
• FOREST LAND: A catchment area of about 1.5 ha or more is kept under natural vegetation upstream of the ponds to serve as a water source during monsoons. The slope of the catchment area is usually very steep. • WATER HARVESTING SYSTEM: Below the catchment area, water harvesting ponds …
According to J Kire, former director of the soil conservation department of Nagaland, the entire community participates in building terraces. A report in the Indian Journal of Hill Farming has this to say of the practice: "Area proposed for terracing is cleared by cutting and burning the jungle. The width …
The Chittor fort was a stronghold of the Raiputana state and, Itill the 16th century, capital of the Raiput house of Gehlots. The fort is constructed on the top of a huge oval-shaped hill. around 152 in high. The steep slopes make the fort inaccessible from all sides. Chliftor had …
THE vision that Rajasthan invokes in most is one of magnificent, awesome and impregnable medieval fortresses. in fact, the most attractive features of the Aravalli hills in the state are its fortified cities and palaces. Some forts have been built on a hill overlooking the city, as is the case …
