Selected Essays on Welfare Ecology: Towards a Better Common Present

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PUBLISHER'S NOTE .Dhrubajyoti Ghosh, an engineer-ecologist, is well known for his initiatives in conserving wetlands. Very little however is known about his thinking on the political philosophy of environmentalism, from where he draws epistemological support for his work. He has a written number of essays on this in course of the present decade. We thought the effort of putting them together worth taking to inspire a lively debate on ecological thinking. The process of putting them together itself forced him to come clear with a definition for the type of work he is doing and intends to share with others. Dr Ghosh has called it WELFARE ECOLOGY and listed his realisations to for 1r1 the bedrock of this new subset of ecology. •

We ·are highly indebted to The Statesman and its Editor-in-Chief, Mr C R Irani, in unhesitatingly allowing reprint o·f these articles a majority of which were originally · printed in that newspaper. One cannot overstate our gratitude · to Dr M S Swaminathan for writing the Foreword.

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Selected Essays On

WELFARE ECOLOGY Towards a Better Common Present

First published in 1999 .

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Copyright © Dhrubajyoti Ghosh •

Published by Samit Chatterjee · For the·. Centre of Sustainable Living.

Centre for Sustainable Living is a non-profit organisation involved in meeting the Rebellion of Nature. FE-111, Salt I .ake City, Sector -3 Calcutta - 700 091

Cover design: Tvishampati Ghosh Printed at: The Statesman Commercial Printing Department Statesman House, 4 Chowringhee Square, Calcutta - 700 001

Price: Rs. 95.00 us $4.99

Selected Essays on

elfare Ecology Towards a Better Common Present

Dhrubajyoti Ghosh /;?'

CENTRE FOR SUSTAINABLE LIVING, CALCUTTA

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To my mother, who influenced my bias and stood by me throughout.

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Physics can't really explain how the water flows from the tap in your sink. When we turn to the vastly more complex questions of human significance, understanding is very thin, and there is plenty of room for disagreement, experimentation, and intellectual and real life _exploration of possibilities, to help us learn more. Noam Cho,nsky

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CONTENTS I. FOREWORD .

2. PREFACE 3. INTRODUCTION : WELFARE ECOLOGY AND THE ECOLOGICALLY HANDICAPPED

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PARTl

I • THE ECOLOGICALLY HANDICAPPED

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2. SUSTAINABLE IMPOVERISHMENT

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3. THE NOT-SO-ALLURING CITIES

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4. BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION

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5. POVERTY AND THE RIGHT TO DIE

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6. BARRIERS TO A WORLD WITHOUT POOR

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7. THE FOURTH WORLD : PLANNING FOR WETLAND WISE USE

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8. CONFRONTING THE REBELLION OF NATURE

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PART2 I. FOR A COMMUNITY BASED WASTEWATER

TREATMENT AND RESOURCE RECOVERY OPTION 2. CONSERVING THE WATER REGIME FOR AN ECOLOGICALLY SUBSIDISED CITY : AN ENVIRONMENTAL AGENDA FOR CALCU'I'IA 3. KEY WORDS KEY CONCEPTS

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Foreword 1be Welfare Ecology Movement which Dr. Dhrubajyoti Ghosh is leading is the most relevant for111 of ecology not only for our country but to the entire developing world. In early 1973, I made the following remad(s while delivering the Coromandel Lecture under the title "Agriculture on Spaceship Earth".* "The environmental policy advocated in the richer nations is • designed to protect the high standard of living resulting from the unprecedented growth in the exploitation of natural resources during the last century, from serious damage by the very processes of such growth. It is of necessity a policy · based on a series of 'donts'. This is inevitable, since the aim i'S to undo some of the damage already done or to prevent fut dJCl damage along the same lines." "The poorer nations, however, are faced with the desire and need to produce more food from hungry soils, more clothing :and more housing. They are aware that, historically, a rising standard of living has depended on the ability of agriculture to release manpower to other more industrial pursuits. They, hence, ·naturally wish to develop more industries and to find productive and remunerative employment for their growing population. For them, conditions of poverty and inadequate arrangements for human and other waste disposal may be greater causes of water and air pollution than the effluents from factories or fertiliser from the fields. Since the causes *Ph!flse see SH·a111i11atl1an, M.S. /982. Science and Integrated R11ral

Develap,11~,,1, Co,,cepl Pabfishings Co. New De/Ju.

Welfare Ecology

of pollution are by and large different, the solutions also will have to be different, and it would be a grave mistake to attempt to copy the policies now being propagated in the developed world." "It is clear, that only integrated land use involving a relevant combination of agriculture, forestry, fishery and animal husbandry, integrated strategies"' of nutrient supply and pest control, greater attention to organic recycling and water conservation and extensive tapping of sunlight through the agency of green plants and simple heat collectors that can help us to improve rural economy without ecological harm. We have a unique opportunity to evolve a policy for natural resource utilisation based on the principles of economics and human welfare. To do this we have to learn how to deploy two of the most potent tools employed by Nature - synergy and symbiosis. Can we do this?" "We can, if we do the following ... First, we have to shed single-discipline-oriented and one-sided thinking and develop a problem-solving and integrated approach. Integration is needed not merely in the planning process, but more urgently at the action level. Second, we must launch a 'techniracy' (technical literacy) programme ai11xxl at imparting technical skills to illiterate peasantry. Third, we must shun the band wagon and aping approach and gene1ate a do rather than a don't atmosphere." Early in 1968 addressing the Agricultural Science Congress Section of the Indian Science Congress at Varanasi, I stated : "Exploitive agriculture offers great possibilities if carried out in a scientific way, .but poses great dangers if carried out with only an immediate profit motive. The emerging exploitive fanning community in India should become aware of this. Intensive cultivation of land without conservation of soil fertility and soil structure would lead, ultimately, to the

Welfare Ecology

springing up of deserts. Irrigation without arrangements for drainage would result in soils getting alkaline or saline. Indiscriminate use of pesticides, fungicides and . herbicides could cause adverse changes in biological balance as well as lead to an increase in the incidence of cancer and other diseases, through the toxic residues present in the grains or other edible parts. Unscientific tapping of underground water will lead to the rapid exhaustion of this wonderful capital resource left to us through ages of natural far 1r1ing. The rapid replacement of numerous locally adapted varieties with one or two high-yielding .strains in large contiguous areas would result in the spread of serious diseases capable of wiping out entire crops. Therefore, the initiation of exploitive agriculture without a proper understanding of the various consequences of every one of the changes introduced into traditional agriculture, and without first building up a proper scientific and training base to sustain it, may only lead us, in the long run, into an era of agricultural disaster rather than one of agricultural prosperity."

In this publication Dr. Ghosh has indicated with striking examples how we can promote a welfare _ecology movement in our country which will help us to accelerate economic growth and wellbeing based on methods which are environmentally and socially sustainable. We owe a deep debt of gratitude to Dr. Ghosh for this labour of love. Prof. Amartya Sen's concept of welfare economics and Dr. Dhrubajyoti Ghosh's advocacy of welfare ecology provide the twin foundations for a sustainable future not only for our country but for the entire planet. This is the pathway for an evergreen revolution in agriculture, industry and human livelihoods.

f). Q. M S Swaminathan UNESCO Chair in Ecotechnology

PREFACE The purpose of this book is to initiate cultivation of a few critical issues within the fold of what has· been tet 111ed as Welfare Ecology. Most of the essays have predominantly explored common events involving mostly the common people, many of which remained unmarked as a phenomenon in ecological inquiries. It is hoped that such a course will not ha1111 the academic credibility of the inquiry. This work may suffer from the limitation of an inadequate grasp of fundamentals when an engineer and not a life scientist, turns ecologist. It has not therefore been a chase for bees and trees, neither has it been those energy flow · calculation through trophic levels. It has, on the contrary, searched for the natural window and technical innovation of the people to set the standards of knowledge in ecology. It would in spite be an expectation in right earnest, that there will be a few who will bear with this subjective framework, more appropriately, its limitations, and take sides in the • ongoing struggle between the advantaged few and the handicapped many. Finally, I have to thank my son, Tvishampati, who grew along with these ideas and rarely agreed with them, because they have always been a curtailment of my time for him and yet, has been lavish in providing his amazing ·computer skills in the moments of crisis.

DJG Calcutta, 27th January, 1999.

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INTRODUCTION

WELFARE ECOLOGY AND THE ECOLOGICALLY HANDICAPPED "What we do about ecology depends upon our ideas of man-Nature relationship" Lynn White ( 1967), quoted in David Pepper's Roots of Modern Environmentalism At the threshold of the third millenium, it is too naYve to say that the world is divided between the rich and the poor and that the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer. We all know about these inequalities. We also know that those who cause this inequity engage appropriate agencies and specialists for hiding this divide, and for giving a human face to this rule of shame and deceit. These contractors hav-e a responsibility to prove to us that all of us are born equal, have common entitlements, and share a common future. In spite of their best initiatives, events all around are too ubiquitous and. prominent to confuse this divide which has resulted in the present environmental crisis. This perception of modem history and world resources i~ the common thread tliat binds all the selected essays in . this ensemble. Where I owe my readers more rigorously, is in the task of explaining what I intend to discuss under Welfare Ecology. •

.A Paradigm That Stinks On 5th June 1993, the United Nations Emvironment Program (UNE~) took a pledge to break the vicious cycle of environment and poverty. At that time, in Somalia, there was hardly a~y food to eat. The warlords who promised to protect 1

Welfare Ecology

the relief organisations and ensure the success of food distribution were themselves in the business of looting. In the countryside, the fat 111ers were chopping down nearby forests for firewood and eating seed grains. In such a situation of calamity, some developed and advanced countries sought t~e opportunity to exploit. They were found dumping their toxic wastes silently off the coast of Somalia, which had some of the most spectacular beaches and rich coral reefs in the world. The poor far111ers · who chopped down nearby forests for firewood and ate seed grains, were ter111ed as exploiters. So also were the advanced countries spoiling the Somalia beach by dumping toxic waste. There must be some serious drawback in the prevailing paradigm that puts these two groups of people together under the same rubric.

Suicides in the Ecosystem From Somalia we move to our country. In course of 1996, about a dozen ·residents committed suicide in Sagar block in the Sunderbans biosphere area. Within a few kilometres from this place there is a village known as Bidhoba Palli or village of widows. All the male members of the village lost their lives in their efforts to draw sustenance from the ecosystem. They were either killed by tigers or scissored by sharks or poisoned by snakes. Other villages in the same area do not show a brighter scenario. Since the beginning of civilisation, humans have identified ecologically friendly patches of land and could choose such places for their settlement and sustenance. With the rise in population and disparity of wealth the weaker sections of the people began to encroach upon the . patches which were comparatively inhospitable for living and making out a 2

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livelihood. The population started rising much faster and poverty became much starker and therefore the poorest were perforce to choose still more difficult patches. For no fault of theirs, the communities such as those who are living in the wetlands of the Sunderbans or the inhospitable te11ains of Kalahandi are .forced to sustain themselves by ecosystems, which· are hostile to them. The poor people braving such systems do not even have their risks covered by -any kind of social insurance . that can comprehensively take care of their uncertainties of survival. They are the ecologically handicapped. I

Similarly, in 1998, more than 100. cotton farmers committed suicide in Warangal district in Andhra Pradesh due to their inability to save their crop from destruction. They were unable to confront the hazards of the ecos~stem from wh·ich they • drew their livelihood. To them the ecosystem became hostile after having been disabled by inappropriate intervention for rapid profits. These people are also the ones who failed because they have been rendered 'ecologically handicapped'. There is a strong likelihood of a rising number of ecol_ogically handicapped people essentially as a result of rampant ecological degradation that is taking place all over. The matter therefore deserves deeper understanding as to how unsustainably is Nature being exploited, who are the people in 11eed of priority attention, and so on. Indeed, in the countryside major structural changes are taking place in relation with most of the transactions with Nature.

A Mercantile Ecological Order in Agriculture and Wilderness There was a time, in the recent past, when Indian villages, like many other Asian villages were self-reliant units hardly in need to look out for any help from the world outside for 3

Welfare Ecology

sustenance of their lives' and li.velihood of their residents. Things have changed and have changed in many cases beyond redemption. Introduction of seeds, fertilisers and pesticides • have transfo11ned the countryside to an extent that a new 'mercantile ecological order' has set in. The three alien interventions from far outside the villages have transfot 111ed a reasonably self-reliant traditional village system into an externally regulated enterprise. In this new order, the traditional knowledge of the villagers of their own productive ecosystem, for a considerable part, has been laid ineffective. This new ecological order which has colonised the old self-reliant agriculture, has contributed eno1111ously in enhancing grain production but _has al~o brought phenomenal disorders in the environment, many of which cannot be restored. I

Similarly, the most handsome profits of the pharmaceutical industry come from the very same areas inhabited by indigenous people with their knowledge about the medicinal properties of the plants that gro~ in the wilderness. None of the traditional knowledge is paid for. There is no system of acknowledgement or repayment for such knowledge - no · system of community copyright, so to speak. But in India itself, out of the 7,500 species of wild plants used by the tribals for medicinal purposes, the pha, rnaceutical industry knows about only 3,500, which it exploits to generate a Rs. 1,000 crore business. The industry promises to grow to Rs 4,000 crore by 2000 AD. Worldwide, the herbal market is estimated at US $4 billion. Yet, no riot has broken out.

The Obliging Exploited In modem times a quiet revolution has swept the world in the area of behavioural manipulation. More and more communities and target groups are gradually adopting the specific psyche tailored for them by those who rule. In fact, 4

Welfare Ecology

those who run the system have perfected the art and science of dampening the legitimate human responses to assaults and seem to have obtained a decree to perpetuate the exploitation. That the rich minority dislikes parting with their 'legitimate' wealth is in fact known to be a classical instinct with such humans. Effective use of the same tool of public response management has begun to influence environ111ental movements too.

Meeting the Challenge Nature conservation is an unavoidable requirement of human survival. Unprecedented greed and uncontrolled exploitation have resulted in wanton dishonour of this fundamental prerequisite of ecological security leading the future of humankind to its worst uncertainty. Fortunately Nature has been sending arrogant signals of disagreen1Cnt for using it as a perpetual sink for uncontrolled disposal of waste or as unlimited provider of resources. So much so that people, mostly the impoverished, are dying in the process of negotiating with the disadvantages of their ecosystems. This rebellion of Nature is the ultimate signal for the humankind to amend its ways and means of living. . The tasks are clearly discernible. There has to be more effective and equitable institutional and scientific effort. There is equal need to create a stronger human resource base amongst the victims of disorder - the empowe1·111ent of the ecologically handicapped. In fact, it has been observed in the course of the last few decades that the success of the first task depends entirely upon that of the second and, therefore, the second task will have _to be understood as central to the entire range of environmental actions to come. It is interesting to note that environmental education and awareness programmes all over the world are aimed at those 5

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who are educated and assume an education system in place. This has immediately left most of the Indians, Africans and a few others outside the scope of all such efforts. Yet it is among these people that most of the ecologically handicapped people are to be found and it is they who must be empowered to bring tangible changes in the existing order of uncontrolled exploitation. Educating the uneducated or the less educated, therefore, becomes the primary task for empowering the ecologically handicapped.

Unpaid Knowledge is Profit Not surprisingly, the traditional knowledge we are just learning to rely upon is well known to the business groups the world over. For instance, for ages, the local people are on record as the best repository of the knowledge of biodiversity and of plants having medicinal properties. Multinationals and their local agents had no difficulty in spotting this opportunity for reaping astronomical profits. Without, of course, paying any price for the knowledge. When men of letters are ye.t to strongly point out - if at all they have themselves understood - that unpaid knowledge is profit, the cleverer entrepreneurs know it clearly and have even a vision for looking ahead. Therefore, they are manipulating inter-governmental treaties on trade relations to protect this profit for eternity. Environmental movements afford to stumble and confuse defining sustainable development but entrepreneurs do not. The refore the present effort to search for the roots.

Why Welfare Ecology The requirement of creating a new subset of ecology rests entirely upon this unprecedented social and historical necessity. It has come at a time when the classical definition of the history of mankind as 'the history of class struggle' is found 6

Welfare Ecology to be inadequate. The history of mankind can be defined more ·suitably as the history of exploitaticm. As an ecologist, I define exploitation as 'unequal transaction'. Exploitation falls under two basic categories, exploitation of h-u mans by the humans, and exploitation of Nature by the humans. Indiscriminate assault on Nature, mostly by the over-consuming rich and powerful, has brought out loud refusals from Nature . .Nature cannot any more be taken for granted to assimilate unlimited waste, neither can it be considered as a provider of unlimited resources. It is not and will never be possible to visualise any major event of social development or of conflict without · understanding its impact on Nature and nam,ral processes. This indeed is a new turn of history. In this backdrop the requirement of 'welfare ecology' as a _subjective tool to challenge the tyranny of over-consumption can be well perceived. Never before did the welfare of humankind, particularly of the poor and the powerless, depend so much on understanding the inter-relationship between Nature and . mankind. Welfare ecology comes handy exactly in this hour of crisis of sustainable living. At this point, I shall be happier to get back to Ernst Haeckel, to know why at all he considered it a subjective requirement to initiate a new discipline, which he called 'Ecology'. That was 1869, when 'God' was being used as a universal currency to transact repression on the po\verless multitude. Today, in the same vein, 'business' · interest, more than anything else, dominates decision-making. Most public decisions are becoming business decisions in a society that is fast becoming 'value neutral'. Blatant failures to abide by the fundamental laws of the land are no longer good enough to arouse any sense of shame even at the highest places of national or 7

Welfare Ecology

provincial governments. Solemnity of 'oath taking' by the politicians in the revered halls of governance is fast becoming the worst mockery of social discipline. The decadent _philosophy of 'self over the rest' is allowed more space to damage the symbiotic living of man and Nature from within. The signature tune of business interest is to be heard al I over. This is indeed a critical event of the human history, and that is where the significance of welfare ecology is best • understood to develop as an intellectual tool. •

For a working definition, WELFARE ECOLOGY is a subset of ecol\Jgy meant for designing better human living. It brings out the concealed and unknown linkages and interrelationships for exposing the fraud on the people and plunder of Nature that combine to threaten the ecological security of humankind. The key postulates that will help for111 the bedrock of the discipline are: • It is the Rebellion of Nature, and not of the oppressed people, th·a t has ·set a new kind of challenge to the seemingly perpetual right allowed in the existing economic order to overexploit Nature and natural resources. • Empowering the ecologically handicapped is the fundamental task of 21 st century environmentalism. • Inappropriate delivery mechanism is often instrumental in denying access to the basic conditions of living and various environmental rights for the population at risk. • Most public decisions are ~coming business decisions.

Experiments in Real Life The present collection of essays has been divided into two parts. The first part includes some of ·the sporadic initiatives 8

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to understand a few majo_r events of modem times, which are familiar hotspots in the general environmental outfield. The second part is on my experiments with ecology in changing the real world for the w~lfare of the masses. Being an engineer by profession, my tryst with ecology, I must be frank, has never been to pursue academics. On the contrary, it was a search for an appropriate philosophical tool to 1nake engineering more beneficial to the common people. Ecology, in the first place, taught me to see from whole to part. It has indeed paid me exciting dividends. I can unhesitatingly say that the basic elements of what I think of as welfare ecology .is heavily drawn from my experiences in incorporating ecological considerations in engineering, and more importantly, in ensuring public involvement in every single step of planning, design, construction and working. Mainstream engineering, even today, has very• little space for ecology. I shall restrict myself from elaborating upon the causes for such indifference and shall only accept the handicap as a given condition. My first lessons in ecology, since early seventies, began during the completion of my doctoral dissertation on urban ecology. This was followed by an assignment from the government of West Bengal in the State Planning Board to carry out a feasibility study for searching a technology option to ·recycle the Calcutta city sewage. This work took me to the wetlands of East Calcutta - which I never left thereafter. I had the privilege of introducing to the rest of the world the significance of these unique wetlands, the traditional knowledge of the local fa11ners and producers . . in using city waste to grow fish and vegetables-in successive resource recovery systems. I could not have a better place to learn ecology for the welfare of the masses. I had to divide this task into two parts. Firstly, to conserve a unique ecosystem, and secondly, to derive a technology option based 9

Welfare Ecology on the traditional practices of wetlands. The technology has been implemented under the Ganga Action Plan.

Wastewater Management: Where the People Know Better •

Unfortunately, the urban perception of the task of wastewater management has essentially been that of pollution control. Conventional mechanical wastewater treatment plants, albeit inadequately, serve this purpose. (Mechanical sewage treatment plants mostly used in developing countries perfot 111 to enrich dissolved oxygen and reduce turbidity but do not entirely remove pathogens). There has also been an alternative worldview. Rural communities, essentially far 111ers, in many of the poorer parts of the world, recognise municipal wastewater as a nutrient pool to be used in fisheries and agriculture. This is a farmercentered approach to wastewater management. In West Bengal, under the Ganga Action Plan, by drawing lessons from the world's largest ensemble of fisheries and agriculture using ·city wastewater (the east Calcutta wetlands), a number of low-cost waste-water treatment and resource recovery projects have been designed and implemented. A unified program has been taken up inv.olving the local people, lhe village panchayat and the implementing authority for setting up a new agenda in wastewater conservation. In a small way though these projects mark the beginning of the turn around. There should be lessons for the future from here. Way back in I 978, in a World Bank/IDRC report attention was drawn towards the non performance of conventional sewage treatment plants and the positive role of fisheries and 10 •

Welfare Ecology

agriculture in setting up a new approach to municipal wastewater management. Subsequently in 1992, Agenda 21 included enough guidelines to prioritise the significance of resource recovery, affordability and community participation This will require municipal wastewater to be viewed as a resource instead of a pollutant, wastewater management should essentially become a task of conservation rather than of pollution control and the knowledge •of the village people should get accommodated in the making of a new subjective base. Most of the Third World countries will have two things in common. In comparison with the developed countries they will invariably be poorer and will h~ve much higher amounts of incident sunshine. It is a matter of interest that these two are the basic ecological conditions to effectively run the system being discussed. Development projects that can . link their success with these two fundamental features of the Third World countries, stand a reasonable chance to contribute effectively to the improvement of the quality of life of the common people at a sustainable pace. .

An Ecologically Subsidised City •

Extension of the ecological study of wetlands of Calcutta gave more exciting results. It helped me to recognize Calcutta as an 'Ecologically Subsidised City'. It is indeed rewarding to see how brilliantly an intellectual tool, in this case ecology, can be used to understand an event much better. We all know that the city of Calcutta has a river to its west to abstract water from, a river to its east to drain out the same, wetlands • to its east for wastewater treatment and production of fish and vegetables, an aquifer below for copious ground water. Enter ecology and it brought all these things together to 1I

Welfare Ecology

visualise a friendly urban water regime that sustains the city. Again, .all these components of the water regime are in a desperate shape and as a whole threaten the collapse of the water regime - arguably the most serious threat of natural disaster the city can ill afford to ignore . •

Limitations These essays have failed to be a coherent whole. Although brought out of the confines of biology, it has not generally been possible to give very clear directions to what the subject matter of welfare ecology should be. Nevertheless, there is an attempt to bring out the relevance of Welfare Ecology as a new subjective tool. A number of incidents have appeared more than once and have been allowed to remain as they were. Firstly because removing them from their respective places would have injured the whole essay; and secondly, the events themselves have been important enough to deserve repeated mention.

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1 THE ECOLOGICALLY HANDICAPPED The story of civilisation is one of man identifying ecologically friendly land for settlement and sustenance. With the rise in numbers and increasing disparity of wealth, the weaker sections of mankind have had to move on to comparatively inhospitable patches. With greater pressure of population, poverty became starker. The poorest had to choose still more difficult regions. The quest for a habitat has forced the denudation of forests, a consequent erosion of the topsoil, and communities forced into umpteen death traps that lie hidden in the wetland systems continue to lose their members. The Sunderbans, for instance. But have those, now relegated to the inhospitable te11ains in the estuarine regions of Bengal, done any wrong? Communities living in the wetlands of the Sunderbans, or the deserts of Rajasthan, sustain themselves in hostile ecosystems without any risk or social insurance to compensate for their uncertain lives.

Unaccounted Risk It ~s to prov·ide occupational and -habitational security to the ecologically handicapped that a socially conscious society should adopt an eco.system approach to development. As a . ' first step, different ecosystem·s should be delineated, for instance, into friendly, inhospitable and hostile. The second step would be to identify the ecologically handicapped and assess the nature of their risks. This can fQt 111 the basis for f01111ulating programmes for action to rescue them from their state of distress. 15

Welfare Ecology

Consider the case of the Sunderbans. The courtyard of B ishnupada Mondo I of Luxbagan Village in Lahiripur panchayat is a good place to begin. This 27-year-old lost his father on November 11, 1989. A tiger dragged him away while he was fishing in one of the many creeks of the Sunderban delta. Phulchand Sardar, Sailen Mistry, Bonomali Maity and abut 20 others of the s~me village lost their lives in a similar manner in the past three years. Several people died of snake bite in the same period .. Bishnupada lost his aunt in 1987 when she was gathering prawn seeds in the river, off the delta. A crocodile chopped off the lower part of her body. An eerie feeling of uncertainty haunts all the villages in the forest fringe. There is provision for a notional compensation from the government to the family losing a member to a tiger. But it must first be . proved that the victim did not go into a protected area and that he did have a valid entry pass. Bishnupada's mother does not seek compensation. What will she do with the money if she does not get back her husband? What are the events regulating life in this region? Paddy cultivation provides · work for about 30 days in two stretches. The next opportunity comes during the prawn seeds catching sea~on. The price of seeds is higher during winter and falls abruptly during summer and efforts in these months are patently unremunerative. The monsoon months again are too risky even for the locals. Therefore, 30 per cent of the ablebodied men go to collect honey or catch fish within the forest. They are the ones who die most frequently. • It is preposterous that the Biosphere Reserve Programme for the region to save the tiger did little to consider the human factor. Indeed, men have died because the programme succeeded. 16

Welfare Ecology

Social Justice Man's conquest over Nature has neither been easy nor unifo11r1. Various communities, at various places and various times have worked through various levels of uncertainty and risks. Nature is entitled to present this uneven challenge to mankind. -But should the civilised concept of social justice be blind to the inequalities in the ecosystems? Communities, which for generations have faced hostile ecosystems from which they have been forced to draw sustenance, must have these uncertainties and risks shared by the environmentally privileged. It is a fundamental principle on which the concept of socio-economic justice should be

based. Since Independence, India has pursued a strategy of subsidy and special assistance initiatives to reduce poverty, mainly based on caste-related programmes in the for1n of special quotas and development programmes. The "ecosystem · approach", as distinguished from the caste-based approach to alleviate poverty, takes a different view of the subaltern millions. The problems of the people are understood in the environmental setting that sustains their efforts to exploit Nature. It also involves the study of the intera~tions that bind man with his surroundings, the ecosystem in which he works. Not all ecosystems are unfriendly. Thus, if we have hostile wetlands of the Sunderbans and the inhospitable laterite soil ecosystem of Purulia district, we also have the friendly floodplains ecosystem of Barddhaman district, all in the state of West Bengal. People of Barddhaman are born privileged, and those i~ the Sunderbans have to struggle. The concept of social equity should apply here as well. 17

Welfare Ecology

In mid-November 1991, the Governor of Maharashtra convened a meeting at the Institute of Rural Management, Anand, to discuss an alternative plan to alleviate poverty and unemployment in India by the end of the century. The basic discussion paper was produced by the International Commission for Peace and Food.

Ecosystem Categories About 20 participants, including specialists from all over the country an9 a few leading politicians, discussed the problems of hostile ecosystems in connection with the poverty eradication programme. A general interest was in evidence in the ecosystem-approach to social upliftment. The need to draw up an action plan to protect the interests of the ecologically handicapped communities on the basis of ecosystem delineation was also appreciated. The first category in this would include such ~osystems, which are friendly towards humans in their efforts to draw wealth from Nature. Then, the category of inhospitable ecosystems; followed by hostile ecosystems. The existing subsidy programme, based on caste distinction is quite inadequate in providing cover for the ecologically handicapped. The ecosystem approach for social benefit would ensure a refreshingly new approach. It would also ensure support for the 'naturally' disadvantaged sections of society and work towards sustainable development for them. It is in the scientific evolution of this strategy that the litmus test of the appropriateness of this alternative approach will lie . •

The Statesman March 12, 1992

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2 SUSTAINABLE IMPOVERISHMENT That a fairly stable ecosystem like the Earth will now be threatened by human action is• a strange testimony to the inherent anarchy in the mechanism of resource sharing born out of a lopsided division of the few and inequitous rich and a large number of poor.• The simple but universal truth that faces the Rio summit today is that the unpaid labour of the poor creates wealth for the rich. The continuity of . this extortion makes the rich richer. Understandably, therefore, the rich have given shape to a civilisation that accepts, for111alises and perpetuates this anarchy in resource sharing. Jne present "Earth Summit" is not aimed at exposing this elementary truth. Not that the rich are not worried. When the poorer countries earn less, eat less, tolerate immense pollution and help amass more· wealth for the rich, what introduces a certain amount of discomfort is when the process of sustained impoverishment becomes so acute that the working populations of the poorer countries become too weak to function. What is necessary is to provide the weak with a quality of life that can at least keep them toiling. The harsh truth is that the exploitation by the advanced nations has led to a state of emaciation in the impoverished countries - Africa, for instance - where millions have lost the ability to work. Science writer Cheryl Simon Silver's warning rang very true when she said, "The wealthy nations must recognise that their continued prosperity depends in part in maintaining the earth's ability to produce food and other resources, and this in tum requires increased prosperity and security in the developing world." ( One Earth, One Future: Our Changing 19

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Global Environment.) This is reason enough for the wealthy nations to actively participate in the Earth Summit of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED).

Expectations from the Summit, as evident in the various preparatory sessions, are high. It was conceived as the last chance to save the ·earth. But K Thompson and John Vidal in their report from New York have clearly identified that "in every sphere, the inspiration which forced the environment on to the agenda had been watered down" . .

The Equador Syndrome To those who had simpler ideas, it is increasingly clear that the right to plunder Nature will not be easily given up by those who are used to this exclusive claim on the world's wealth. Consider this example: in 1972, Ecuador produced 60,000 barrels of oil per day from 50 wells - a daily average of · 1,200 barrels higher than an average Middle East well and a thousand times greater than an average US well at that time. Before 1987, Ecuador was said to have no oil and the country reeled under the yoke of poverty. In hindsight it is clear that this was a myth propagated by oil barons of the west who found it profitable to project Ecuador as a no-oil land where it could sell. Why else did so many oil experts pretend to sniff around and smell not a whiff of oil? It was a US Colonel, Leonard Clerk, who first told the American press in 1947 that there were oil reserves in Ecuador comparable to that of the Middle East. A French technician, Jacques Boulanger, contracted by the government, wrote an 20

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official report with reference to 1963. Published by their Planning Board, the report said: "The reason for the country's oil situation is, on the one hand, the inactivity of many of the concessionaires; and on the other, the very limited activities of the producing fi1111s, because for them it is more convenient and more profitable to import oil at the present· prices than to drill for it in Ecuador". What happened in Ecuador continues today, all over the world .. The Ecuador Syndrome can be recognised in most global events whose thrust is so to keep the weak weaker, by hook or by crook, till the deceit is found out. It is this Ecuador Syndrome which is the black hole of ecology where all the democratic ideas and forces fighting for a more equitous world - coming within its influence - disappear, never to emerge again. It has made a mockery of democracy as a dete11ninant of the rationale for human life, or to improve the quality of the life of the poor. An event as temporal as the Earth Summit will be too insignificant to even scratch the surface, leave alone make a dent in the thinking of the powers that threaten the survival of mankind. The sceptic, therefore, does not set much store by the Rio summit, though the consequent struggle may be protracted. This appears to be a fairly realistic assessment. Environment movements are like trade union movements (in real sense of the ter111, and not in the for111 of many ugly derivatives). In a trade union movement, the workers bargain with the employer for better wages and better living conditions. In an environmental movement, common people bargain for a better quality of life. Environmentalism is thus the highest stage of trade unionism. It must be a protracted struggle. It is towards th·at struggle that the present Earth Sumni ~an make a beginning_. •

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Governmentese For most of mankind, the Earth Summit will, however, remain too remote to matter. For a privileged few it will be an opportunity to enlarge contacts. For the . organisers it will be a defence of their high salaries and lifestyles. For others it may even be a source of despair. This is why Roul Montenegro, in the April number of the Global 500 Newsletter of the United Nations, said that the "UNCED is an inter-governmental conference defined by governmental documents and pre-cooked governmentar decisions, so governments will discuss and even agree in Rio, but this will not guarantee either the acceptance of the people or ironically, the salvation of the global environment". In this same context Montenegro says that nearly one billion people (one fifth of world's population) are severely undernourished and living under conditions of unemployment and lack of food. Of them, 500 million have no access to potable water.. Yet every minute, the defence industry wastes nearly Rs 6 crore. Hunger, injustice, anns expenditures of a few countries and the international bureaucracy are also growing hand in hand. These statistics, adds Montenegro, are shameful and show clearly that the current global order - the United Nations included - is functioning badly. If the present world order ~s questioned and an alternative is to be found, perhaps a beginning may be made at the individual level, by taking up a sustainable lifestyle. After all, if we consume less, ':Ne preserve the resources and draw less from Nature.

Combating Comsumerism It was welcome, therefore, that at a recently concluded meeting of tilt' Global 500 Laureates from South Asian Association

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for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries, a decision was taken to adopt an agenda for the UNCED process, which emphasised on consumerism and environmental ethics. The importance of environmental action to initiate a relentless battle against unfettered consumerism, and a campaign to uphold a sustainable way of living were the salient features of the agenda. The damage already wrought by uncontrolled media and other support, to change consumer behaviour and help increase the entrepreneurs' profit at the cost of the least developed countries is phenomenal. The UNEP Global 500 community is committed to fighting consumerism on a war footing. The agenda also charted the areas of function, aimed at avoiding the production and purchase of products which are injurious to health, or those produced by processes that cause serious occupational hazards to the workers engaged in producing them and the people · living in contiguous areas. It was also aimed at encouraging a simple, sustainable lifestyle and avoiding luxurious and wasteful expenditure. • Another positive chance to reduce the anarchy in the existing resource use will lie in an age_n da of action that will be locally developed on precisely defined environmental issues.

Battle in Our Backyard We have a small example in our own backyards - in the wetlands of Calcutta. Conservation efforts in these wetlands began more than a decade ago. The challenge here was twofold: to restrict further reclamation of the wetlands for urban expansion and to develop a self-reliant technology for municipal sanitation on the basis of Calcutta's own practice. In -both these· eff~rts, the stiffest resistance came from separate groups of vested interests, who were essential),, 1'~en real 23

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estate speculators, or those keen to sell non-viable technology of mechanical sewage treatment plants. The decade-long conservation efforts have succeeded in keeping such interests at bay. Such sustained efforts, at a global level, will bring more success to the people of the poorer parts of the world.. If we have several such small examples, their collective strength can be the prime moving force in bringing about a fundamental shift in the ~orld order in favour of - and according to the te, 1,1s dictated by - the neglected millions. '

The Statesman May 30, 1992

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3 THE NOT-SO-ALLURING CITIES The eighties were lean years for urban studies, when specialists chose other areas of attention. Urban management studies gained currency in the nineties with liberal funding for publications of this kind. Even if one differs from the conclusions of the book edited by Nigel Harris, its academic excellence, given the complexities of the task in hand, is not to be doubted. The book is inspired by two policy papers published in 1991, one each from the World Bank (WB) and the United Nation Development Program (UNDP), on which a workshop was conducted by the development and planning unit of the University College, London. The participants, all eminent thinkers and professionals, focused on the new challenges facing urban development. Not unexpectedly, such books tend to lose a meridional theme with diverse ideas flowing in freely. This book is commendable for npt having been a rudderless venture. u

The campaign throughout is to change the "project" approach to a "programme" approach to development, which attempts a comprehensive look at the problem. The emphasis is also on macro-development issues. The book criticises the sectoral approach of conventional development planning, taking particular exception to the absence of linkages between what goes on in a .given sector and the macro-economic perfor111ance. Sectoral differences in the World Bank's own office at 1818 H Street, N.Y., are no less striking.

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City Challenges The base papers, separately produced by the UNDP and the World Bank, nearly overlap. The World Bank paper underlines four challenges: augmenting urban productivity; ameliorating urban poverty; improving urban environment; and increasing research on urban issues·. The UNDP talks of five challenges, of which the first two can be clubbed together as urban poverty amelioration, followed by improvement in environmental quality, promotion of private sector organisations, and finally, strengthening local governments and administrations. ' The Bank's policy paper argues that urban issues are macrodevelopmental in nature; and that the success of several key objectives of the development strategy is tied to the Bank's approach and follow-through on urban issues. Macro-level analysis seems to be the new-found cutting edge in modem thinking for resolving complex urban issues. Tim Lankster's opening address at the workshop raised a doubt that persisted. In spite of the intellectual consensus on current development issues (this refers to the similarity of tJ:te two papers from the World Bank and the UNDP) Lankster said, "Policy and practice in most of the developing world are still lagging sadly behind." It may be the early days (of urban i!Sues being taken up in world forums), but if there is so much agreement on what needs to be done, why does so little appear to be happening? Reading the book over and over again, one is assailed by the same question. The consolation perhaps is that these are indeed the "early days". In a lighter vein, the reader can link this worry to that of Al Van Huyek in his final address, in which he felt compelled to say that ·he saw Michael Cohen, chief of the urban 26

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development division, drinking wine at lunch. Can we trust, AI Van asked, the· future of urban policy to such a man?

Looking Townwards A brief account of urban development efforts, especially in

relation to aid agencies, by .Nigel Harris shows the change from an almost exclusive orientation on rural development to the present emphasis on urban issues. The first sign of change, in the fo1111 of capital projects being replaced by programmes of technical assistance and 'enabling', was visible in the UNCHS effort in 1988. In 1991, the World Bank defined the new 'orthodoxy' on the urban sector in its document on urban policy and economic development, which combined the emphasis on the economically .productive role of the cities with the style of assistance relating to governments as facilitators rather than as providers. Close on its heels, the UNDP published its strategy paper, Cities, People and Poverty, which was clearer in its emphasis on the role of recipient governments in deter111ining programmes. The World Bank and the . UNDP policy papers and the proceedings of the workshop, however, made a preposterous effort to influence national policies of the borrowing countries to attach greater importance to urban management. Framing national policies should remain entirely a prerogative of the people of ~he respective countries through their elected governments. Can a developing country be allowed to influence the defence spending of developed countries in case these are found to be patently anti-people?

Poverty Perspectives To look at the issue from a simpler perspective, the factor prompting the need to influence the national policy for 27

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introducing an urban bias is stated to be the rise in the urban percentage of a country's population, projected to reach about 50 per cent by 2025 AD. If so, the same arithmetic would hold good in the classification of voters who deter1nine the future of any politician. If 50 per cent of the voters become urban, politicians will perforce introduce t~e necessary urban bias, courtesy parliamentary democracy. The recent eagerness to include poverty alleviation in all programmes is welcome so long as it does not become a cliche. Poverty is, after all, an outcome of economic policies adopted at global, national and bilateral levels. It is important to remember that rarely do the beneficiaries get more than 10 per cent of the aid, though the bulk of repayment load has to be-borne by them. Efforts to make the system of aid utilisation more efficient will be much more pragmatic than any amount of esoteric research designed to reduce urban poverty. The issue of poverty is extremely tricky. The deeper one probes the phenomenon, the more complex it becomes. Hence, it is wiser to draw up action plans from clearly visible ex_pressions of urban poverty such as ragpicking, pavement ... _dwelling and infor ,rial and temporary settlements. Discussions on matters environmental are commonplace. What is significant is that the workshop did a critical assessment of the Rio agenda. This was criticised for having been not about people but "all about national resources" and for not paying attention to institutional and local responsibilities. The call for 'brown agenda' parallel to a 'green agenda', is typical of a well-versed salesperson in this field of intellectual • consumerism. Documents placed at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro did, however, put .on record the statement of Lawrence Summers, chie( economist of the World Bank, who found enough reasons 28

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to encourage "more migration of dirty industries to the least developed countries". The cost of pollution, according to him, depends on earnings lost through deaths and injuries, and these are the lowest in the poorest countries; polluting the cleanest parts of the world is less ha1111ful; and the cost of pollution would decline if polluting industries move from rich ~o poor countries. The World Bank policy paper, read out at the London workshop being discussed here, is silent on the chief economist's views.

Managing Lobbi~ Yet another clear _omission on part of the workshop is the conflict between private sector interests and those- of the poverty-stricken. It is tempting to recall the assessment of a senior bureaucrat, who felt" that it would be extremely difficult to pursue the "pond system" technology to replace the conventional sewage treatment plants, for the simple reason that the private houses promoting the plants have money to buy the decision at appropriate places. Nor does the book appreciate the significanc~ of an ecological approach based on holistic observation, or looking from the whole to a part. Urban ecology is well established as a discipline and competent to establish new connections between various urban activities and phenomena. It will indeed need a new kind of manager to improve the urban environment. Thebook does not say much in this area. · '

All the same, a n~mber of practical problems were correctly identified in the course of the workshop. The book debates ·whether urban responsibilities should be sectoral or crosssectoral. If a separate urban environmental agency is created it will be weak. "Each time it approaches the minister of finance with 'green issues', the minister says we are dealing •

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with more important things. On the other hand, if you try to make urban issues cross-sectora1, there are real problems of making it a serious question in the ministry of finance as opposed to the ministry of urban development." Similarly, Nigel Harris .. isolates a paradox of poor societies, . which tend to be extravagant in all possible ways, taking twice . as much gasoline to drive a car or to produce power. "Without any energy policy in the cities you cannot relieve the balance of payments," Harris comments. The problem of increasing 'rent-seeking' among government officers has also been mentioned. These discussions would have become effective if they could be linked to the way western consumerism has been thrust upon the poorer i·ountries and to the World Bank's apathy towards its environmental and energy audits at the planning stage. Commendably, the book has been made available in less than a year after conclusion of the workshop. In contrast, the World Bank volume on the Calcutta Wetlands Conference in 1988 took three full years to see the light of the day, The haste has, however, produced inaccuracies unbecoming · of such publications. On page 215, for example, only four challenges are listed instead of five. For all that, this book has an importance. Thinkers of international repute have at least acknowledged urban poverty as a phenomenon meriting their exclusive attention.

The Statesman, December 26, 1992

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..

NOTE: Tlie article is a review of an edited co,npilation of papers placed

at a worksl1op 11,at l1as bee11 mentioned i11side. It lias been i11cluded in this antlwlogy because it sl1arply delineates Dr Ghosli 's insistence on a holistic approacli a,uJ also on putting across the point of view of l1is world, the Southern co1,ntries. The title of the book reviewed is: Cities in the /990: T/1e Cl1allenge for DeveloJJi11g Countries, Edited by Nigel Harris ( £!Cl Press)

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4 BIODIVERSITY CONVERSATION Calcutta's wetlands are the latest hotspots in today's biodiversity scenario, but not perhaps for the right reasons. They are, of course, precious to Calcutta, not only because they treat Calcutta's sewage but because they represent a wealth of traditional science, and have much to teach the modem world on conservation and utilisation, as well as on how to create a tangible urban facility and defend it against the onslaught of real estate interests. Small wonder, therefore, that national and international experts have started to take note of Calcutta's success stories and even find time to study them. The thanks are entirely due to those far111ers and fish producers whose creative abilities have given the Calcutta wetlands a pride of place.

Unique Experience In fact, the Indo-British workshop on biodiversity held in Calcutta, with specific focus on the wetland ecosystems in the second week of February, was perhaps inspired by Calcutta's unique experience. Two other workshops were simultaneously held in Bangalore and Jodhpur relating specifically to forests and arid deserts. Whatever may have been the quality of local participation, the presence of the three British specialists, Michael Walkey. Alan Hildrew and Cluris Newbold, added an additional dimension to the proceedings. This, despite the fact that none of them had been exposed to wetlands issues of this country. Therefore, they had as much to learn from India as the Indians from them. Significantly, infor111al dialogue with them began 31

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even before the formal inauguration of the biodiversity convention. With sustainable use as the focus - as in any discussion on wetlands, Calcutta or elsewhere - the deliberations were on the role of Ramsar, an intergovernmental bureau for setting out strategies on wetlands management. The changed perception of wetlands management even in the Ramsar Convention was acknowledged, with the new focus on the significance of sustainable use almost outweighing its initial • narrower legacy of waterfowl preservation. But there was also the realisation that Ramsar, set up in 1971, has not been as effective as it was expected to have been in projecting the cause of wetlands conservation, though the tropical forest movement has gained strength within a comparatively shorter time. Significantly, the Rio conference. hardly featured programmes on wetlands ·conservation. It was clear that wetlands conservation hadn't yet become a movement that arouses the interests of the common people.

Priority: People The British team visited the Bhitarkanika and the Chilika Lake in the state of Orissa. There was little doubt that the poorest of the poor, who drew sustenance from such wetland ecosystems, should be given first priority. It is no fault of theirs' that a large number of people are forced to thrive on such ecosystems like the Sunderban mangroves or Bhitarkanika, and face the jaws of death in their efforts to eke out a living. Very little is also known about the note of the mafia who force the poor prawn farmers to sell their catches at shamefully low prices, while they earn phenomenal profits. For these mafia, the entry of the c~rporate sector is not welcome. The mafia will have to find a way to protect their territory and 32 •

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their right to the loot. They have done this well enough in Chilika. Apart from the specific problem areas, there is also a la~k of awareness in India among those who take decisions on wetlands - many are not even aware that flood plains are wetlands. In Africa, the largest wetland conservation projects are in their flood plains. In India, rising riverbeds create more waterlogged areas. This reduces the agricultural turnover and brings hardship to the people. The task of managing these flood plains is enor11,ous, and will have to undergo a basic change in both attitude and objective. The strategy is clear - the water will have to be stored (to the extent possible) rather than drained out. All the three .specialists agreed that such a project in flood plain management would be a trendsetter in this part of the world. This workshop was too premature to discuss strategies on wetlands management in Indian flood plains . •

Admittedly, such occasional workshops thrust an additional burden on organisers. And despite the best of efforts, they tend to fall short of meaningful deliberations that could lead to tangible benefits for those who are central to such conversation. They are the thousands of wetlands subalterns who are unable to work out a subsistence living, or even to get stable employment, in spite of having excelled in all conceivable aspects of developing a strategy for sustainable use of wetlands. Calcutta's Mudial i workers are a case in point. True, there are the specialists who genuinely care. But there is the unhappy commonality among all those who earn their living by creating an organised train of words - the experts - in that they seem to be indifferent to basic human rights for a large 33

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number of people struggling to We are worried about birds. integral part of the wetland People who are living on the for their own survival.

survive on wetland ecosystems. Yes, of course, birds are an lives. But so are the people. wetlands and conserving them

The Statesman February 27, 1993

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5 ENVIRONMENT AND POVERTY RIGHTS In Somalia there is hardly .any food to eat. The warlords, who promised to protect the relief organisations and ensure the success of food distribution, are themselves in the business of looting. In the countryside, farmers are eating seed grain and chopping down nearby forests for firewood. In this appalling picture of poverty, some advanced countries seek opportunities to exploit. They silently dump their toxic waste off the coast of Somalia, which has some of the· most spectacular beaches and rich natural coral reefs. Indeed, Somalia is an example of how the vicious circle of poverty and the environment operates. •

Around the world, says Elizabeth Dowdeswell, executive director, UNEP "more than one billion people live in poverty and a part of being poor means destroying today what could have sustained you tomorrow. Not by chance, but as a necessity for immediate survival". Today, there is "an increasing international concern about this interface of poverty and the environment. Extreme poverty," Mrs Dowdeswell adds, "must be eliminated, not only for humanitarian reasons, but also for environmental ones. Wherever extreme poverty is a problem, there you will find the poor sacrificing long-ter111 benefits - what we call sustainability - to the short-time need to survive." This is why the UNEP is focusing on the relationship between poverty and environment on World Environment Day, 1993. It is for every individual to examine this relationship at a personal level, in his place of work, in his neighbourhood. 35

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Words and Deeds In India, as elsewhere, poverty has been the centre of very erudite attention for at least half a century. In 1970, the Ford Foundation initiated a series of 12 studies on several crucial problems; poverty was one and Professor V M Dandekar, who dealt with the subject, produced what is an acknowledged benchmark document on poverty in India. He recommended garnering of greater resources for meeting the needs of the poor and restrictions on conspicuous consumption by the rich. But though a large share of plan expenditure is allocated for poverty alleviation, no more than 10 per cent, conceded late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, reach the target community. While the warlords of Somalia use violence to achieve this, Indians do it in an institutionalised manner.

Kalahandi, a Block Hole This is not to say that the world is unaware of this sinister denouement, or of the perils of consumerism. Many more studies followed the Dandekar and Rath reports, while many more Indians slipped below the poverty line. The povertyenvironment relationship found the worst possible manifestation in India - the horror of Kalahandi. As in Somalia, people in Kalahandi starve to death. This Orissa district, spread over 11,772 sq. km, has a population of nearly 1.6 million. It also has a forest area of about 5,000 sq. km; and a slightly higher net sown area. There are only 23 industrial units, which employ 500 people. Falling in a rain shadow area, Kalahandi, after the end of the three months of monsoon, has little water. Not more than eight per cent of the net sown area has irrigation, and ·with the monsoons disappear hopes of the new crop and the moisture from the . soil. The loosely bound mixture of coarse sand and local clay cannot retain water. Worse; it is devoid of plant nutrients. •

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In this ecosystem, whatever little the far111ers grow must be used to repay the usurers' debts. The predictable drought after the rains means price hike in anticipation. Inflation, usury and a bleak future leave the villagers with little option but to chop down forests and sell the wood to timber traders. A whole day's labour fetches a couple of rupees. Little else need be said about life in Kalahandi. There is the much talked-about Indravati project, expected to bring water to five of Kalahandi's 18 blocks. This project, which has displaced 18,000 people, suffered a setback on July 28, 1991, when a tunnel under construction collapsed, even as scientists debated the beneficial impact of the dam. Indeed, Kalahandi is a textbook example of povertyenvironment interaction going downhill. The tribals are surrounded by a hostile ecosystem, which handicaps them ecologically, precluding possibilities of selfsustaining lifestyles. Yet the country that can talk about the plight of the physically handicapped, does not seem to care for the ecologically handicapped. Not even environmental activists have taken up Kalahandi as a priority item on their agenda for breaking the vicious circle of poverty and the environment. Yet, Kalahandi is a grim example of all the factors essential for an environmental disaster, beginning with the rising population of landless fat 111ers - Kalahandi has the highest percentage of such fa1111ers in Orissa. A landless fat 111er is a dispossessed person and an immediate threat to his ecosystems, which he is otherwise competent to maintain sustainably. The region is steeped in illiteracy, which provides yet another tool for exploitation in the hands of the trader. Adding to the socio-economic woes is physical trauma - the tribals routinely 37

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suffer terrible pain in the head and stomach. In the absence of medical aid or relief, death is the only cure. When death stalks a community, environment becomes a non-issue.

Negative Flow . These four factors lead to continuing and multiplying poverty globally. The world as a whole, says Alan Durning, is less equitable than any nation. A fifth of humanity, living in the richest countries, have an average income 15 times higher than the fifth living in the poorest countries. The eighties saw the poor getting poorer in Africa, Latin America and parts of Asia. A World Bank report on world debt says that since 1982, there has been a net transfer of capital from the recipient to the donor countries, while loans have remained around $110 billion. There was a negative net transfer (obtained by deducting repaid principle and interest from the total loan), with the flowback increasing from $2 billion in 1982 to $52 billion in 1990 from the recipient to the donor countries. The lenders justified their investment by the handsome returns, but has there been any such justification in the recipient countries, which got poorer in the process, for having borrowed in the first place? Warning the profiteers was Cheryl Simon Silver, in her book, One Earth One Future: Our Changing Global Environment, that the wealthy nations "must recognise that their continued prosperity depends in part on maintaining the earth's ability to supply food and other resources", she says, "and that in tum requires increased prosperity and security in the developing world". The developed world may not pay heed to this sciei:ice writer but, at least, the experts back home cannot remain oblivious to this fact of life. Poverty and environmental disorders are in a way measures of anarchy in the prevailing order of human living, which 38 •

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must be changed to achieve per 111anent restoration of our environment, to rid the world of poverty, to save our children who will inherit this world from us. The offenders - the organisations of the rich nations, along with the wealthy in the poorer nations - need to be tackled by a united front: the masses and the environmental workers .backed by scientific reasoning and effective political will.

Factual Basis The fact is that all public decisions are essentially political decisions. If backed by reliable scientific understanding of the issues, the battle becomes easy. Yet, several environmental movements develop weakness, not because the case is weak, but because of inadequate attention paid to sciel')ce. Admittedly, political patronage is hard to come by, but times without number has the establishment wrecked promising movements of the people. To consider an example nearer to me - the Calcutta wetlands - there were over enthusiastic activists who, in their zeal to press for conservation, said these wetlands recharged groundwater and even provided technical data on oxygen supply from these wetlands to the atmosphere; something that has not been established. R A J Arthur's perceptive remark, that such campaigns "are undeniably successful with the public but could, in the long run, bring the scientific foundations of Green claims under much more active scrutiny", is important for Indian conservationists. Effective propaganda is not always the effective cure for ailments featuring the interface between a community and its habitat, and only authentic scientific observation can be the foundation of an effective environmental action. The task of breaking the vicious circle of poverty and environment is by no means easy. There are instances of 39

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industry breaking the law, putting commercial self-interest before public safety; exporting hazardous waste to the Third World, which "challenge modem society at its roots". But opposition to this can be built up only if the victims are provided with an alternative social order, sensitive to ecological values. Towards that end, ecologists have made little progress. The poor in many places have only one right - the right to die. Will the World Environment Day usher in a new dawn for them, where people join hands to give them a right to life? Can a beginning be made with Kalahandi ?

The Statesman June 5, 1993

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6 BARRIERS TO A WORLD WITHOUT POOR On Friday, July 23, 1993, eight children sleeping in the open on a street in the heart of Rio De Janeiro were decimated. The city was the well of the 'polluters'. Between 1988 and 1990, in Brazil 4,611 children had been exter111inated. The country's poverty statistics improved. Brazil is indeed "catchin'em-young". Rio is the city of the Earth Summit, held in 1992. The 'exter111ination' model is only a crude version of the problems for those with a penchant for decent living. Such 'marginal' happenings do not affect the learned minorities who are keener to protect their career interests and collective bargains. Others, who are able to sense the opportunity, discuss poverty to become rich. Indeed, poverty studies pay rich dividends. In such a milieu, UNEP scheme deserves a cautious welcome. A few elementary questions demand immediate answers.

The Threat The UNEP programme to eliminate absolute poverty stems from the assumption that the people who are extremely poor tend to inflict damage to the environment. Therefore, to protect the -environment, poverty will have to be eliminated. The question is, what is the measure of the threat (global as well as countrywise) caused by the poorest people in the for111 of biomass or in any other conventional unit of measure? Since the UNEP has taken up this new campaign, it may be safe to assume that it has assured itself of its significance on the basis of quantitative assessment of the environmental losses 41

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inflicted upon by the poorest of the poor. With this info1111ation, one may compare the figures of losses inflicted upon by the industrial nations on air; water and biodiversity. Only on the basis of these comparative figures can the UNEP sustain the campaign as a major environmental issue. The second question relates to the importance the UNEP has attached to this campaign. How much is being spent to break the vicious cycle of poverty and the environment this year the total budget and the ratio it bears to the total UNEP budget? This info1111ation may then be linked with nationallevel efforts that are targetted to supplement the UNEP , programme? Difference between pious ambitions and real motives are not unknown in major global operations. Therefore, the UNEP will have to explain exactly how the extremely poor are to · be resettled in the changed social hierarchy. Will they go the way of the Brazilian children? Unless the objective is cle.arl.y stated and understood and the mechanism for implementation meticulously worked out, grassroots level aberrations in implementing the programme will be entirely impossible. To consider a well-defined planning objective one may study the report of the National Planning· Committee. Set up in 1937 by the Indian National Congress and chaired by Jawaharlal Nehru, it indicated the national planning objective as provision of proteins, carbohydrates and minerals with a calorific value of 2,400 to 2,800 units for an adult worker; improvement of clothing from the poorest consumption of 15 yards ( 13.7 metres) in 1939 to an average of at least 30 yards (27.4 metres) per capita per annum. The clarity of objectives should ensure that there is no bungling down the . line. Alongside the objectives should come the question of coordination. 42

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Along with this requirement of a clear objective, a parallel question immediately arises here. How will the UNEP's endeavour be integrated with national level programmes to eliminate poverty? Most countries, India included, have their own programmes for poverty reduction and . environmental • controls. The UNEP's efforts should strengthen the existing efforts on the basis of clearly defined areas of action; or run parallel to them or opt for a combination of both with welldefined boundaries. Unless this question of institutional interface is publicly discussed and thrashed out, the success of the campaign, even if funds are available, will remain in doubt.

1ime Factor No one will disagree that this factor is crucial for the success of any programme, the UNEP's campaign included. What is the expected time by which extreme poverty can be eliminated? If the programme is a phased one, the logic behind such phasing needs to be explained. Poverty elimination, after all, is no mean task and can only begin to make an impact with sustained and deter 11ained efforts, especially_where the action group knows what it is up against and how it ~ill tackle the barriers.

This should first include the priorities of action. A map of the ·critically affected areas, where the most serious environmental losses are being inflicted by the poorest, would be a useful guide for all campaigners of the poverty eradication programme.

Quite apart from the issue of international and national level coordination is the question of linkages with two other significant United Nations programmes: one on population and the other on t~e indigenous peoples the world over. The 43

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poverty-population issue has been well discussed, and the UNEP is expected to have a clear perception of the issues involved in the population programme. The second linkage with preserving the indigenous peoples - seems to be an area of comparative darkness in ter111s of specific plans. It may be remembered that Brazil has lost about 90 tribes in the first half of this century. Reportedly, one-third of North American and two-thirds of Australian languages have disappeared. In fact, half of the 600 languages still known to be in use will disappear within a century, "as their speakers are forced to abandon their natural habitats and are assimilated into dominant societies". A welcome trend emerged with the United Nations declaring 1993 as the Year of Indigenous People, to understand the worth of these "natural ecologists" - ancient people in cultures that pursue a lifestyle and work ethos in ha1111ony with Nature; . people whose social mores are based on the seemingly ultramodern concepts of preserving biodiversity. Their understanding of Nature is inn-ate, not cultivated. Their dependence on Nature is total, so also is their commitment to the preservation of Nature. Only, this is no artificial or motivated concern; it is a concern that is part of the system.

Sons of the Soil In a recent workshop in Bangalore, a leading environmentalist advised activists not to romanticise the role of tribal people. "Tribals do not have a tradition of planting forests. It is finally the birds and bees and moths who do this," he said. The environmentalist was reminded that "if the tribals did not plant trees it was because they understood Nature enough to realise that this would be left to the birds and bees". Notwithstanding the sympathy and concern for the cause of biodiversity and the pride in India's richness on this score,

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there is little appreciation of the fact that India also happens to be one of the richest habitats for indigenous peoples. It is these people and their practices that are today threatened. In the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and in Arunachal Pradesh, a number of indigenous tribes are on the verge of extinction. This extinction is stated to be on account of infant mortality, often due to malnutrition. Would such people, for instance, feature in the UNEP scheme? Poverty is a measure of anarchy in resource sharing that is in-built in the prevailing social order. Rich nations and the rich people of the poor nations deny the starving millions their legitimate entitlement to the earth's resources. There is a long history of poverty studies and of the efforts to reduce it. Papers available with the UNEP on the poverty-environment interface have succeeded in provokiog ordered thinking. They set the pace for an appropriate exchange of inf0111 aation and knowledge between the root and the branches, and are vital to the success of the campaign. But the exchange of inf011nation must be far more intensive, the debates far more exhaustive.

The Statesman August 7, 1993

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7 THE FOURTH WORLD: PLANNING FOR WETLAND WISE USE Wetland resources are increasingly being recognised for their usefulness in addressing a range of present-day problems. Knowledge of these uses is mostly based on local practices. The Ramsar Convention - an international treaty for conservation of wetlands - first put together info1111ation on the multiple uses of wetlands. Its proceedings include 17 case studies in wise use of wetlands, of which four each are from Asia, Europe and Africa, two from Central Asia, Europe and Africa, two from Central America and one each from Canada, the US and Australia. India is represented by a case study of the east Calcutta wetlands for urban sanitation and resource recovery. Although the cases are location-specific, it is possible to identify several new wetland management priorities. These include enhancing food security, strengthening rural development and urban sanitation. Wise use exponents have broken new grounds, of which the most relevant is the use of flood plains. These have triggered serious debates on wetland conservation and management options in India in general and Calcutta in particular, leading to wider awareness of the need for conservation.

Resource Base But not many realise the significance of wetlands or the role of wetland practices in strengthening the country's resource base. Even scientists dealing with wetland matters are not always appropriately oriented. Over the years, two streams of

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perceptions have developed around the wetlands. The older stream came from the indigenous people, particularly in the poorer parts of the world, who drew sustenance from the wetland ecosystems. The new stream originated from a group of waterfowl lovers who considered wetlands mainly as an avian habitat. These waterfowl enthusiasts brought about the Ramsar Convention in 1971. But the initial shortcomings of the Ramsar Convention in failing to adequately include human interests in jts objectives was soon overcome and it reoriented its priorities. In Regina, at the third meeting of the contracting parties in 1987, Ramsar provided the basis for appreciating the utility of wetlands in relation to critical human needs. It recommended that the contracting countries prepare national wetland policies, to be based on wise use considerations, on the basis of clear guidelines on national wetland policies. The first response came from Canada. The federal policy on wetland conservation, adopted in 1991, is a good reference document for others who intend to take up the issue of wetland conservation in real earnest. The objective of the Canada policy paper is to "promote the conservation of Canada's wetlands to sustain their ecological and socio-economic functions, now and in the future". The agricultural options in wetlands are available in the proceedings of the third international wetland conference of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Wetlands, k11own as highly productive ecosystems, are considered amongst the most prospective areas for meeting the challenge of food security in Third World countries. Most wise use products with Ramsar support include extensive provision for rural development. In fact, the basic impetus to any wetland resources utilisation project will come from the countryside and local people will be the prime beneficiaries.

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Earlier, a document on wetland conservation, published by the IUCN, reviewing current issues and suggesting lines of action, concluded that as the efforts to integrate wetland conservation and rural development increased, it became evident that target communities were in a unique position to provide insights into appropriate resource management options. Unfortunately, not much is known about the way the wise use projects were drawn up to include rural development attributes, and this knowledge will remain with the people unless conservation workers find out these details. Another area of significance is the use of wetlands for sewage treatment and resource recovery. Out of 17 wise use case studies included in the Ramsar list, only one was about an urban wetland, the one from Calcutta. Conservation of urban wetlands poses altogether a different set of challenges from those in the countryside. It is difficult to save wetlands from the clutches of realtors unless they provide a significant facility. • The Calcutta wetlands have set an example of how a wetland can be conserved even in the face of a stiff challenge from the real estate lobby, essentially because the wetlands perfo1111 the task of urban sanitation for the metropolitan city at an affordable cost. They provide a pointer to the poorer countries for developing least-cost sanitation facilities in wetlands close to the city's fringe. Amo11g the rece11t lessons learnt froan tl1e wetlands are those about the value of flood plains. For many parts of India, specifically in West Bengal, appropriate use of flood plains , holds the key to sustainable use of a resource base, including water. Watershed management is still a new concept. Larger areas get waterlogged, lose productivity and even become useless. Sustainable alternatives involve converting this 48

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calamitous import of water i11to wealth by storing it for efficient use.

Main Problem The problems of flood plains are mainly four-fold. First, poor productivity of the arable land because of waterlogging. Second, the weakest section of the rural population is subjected to the greatest suffering associated with waterlogged environs. Third, the accumulated water is mostly unutilised when it should be conserved to convert the problem into a solution. Finally, the lack of facility or policy supports to cover the risks of those who are doomed by birth to depend on these inhospitable ecosystems for their sustenance. This is a question of the fundamental social outlook of a community. As a matter of routine, engineering problems of flood plains are attended to by the department of irrigation and drainage of the state governments. However, the principal engineering effect centres around draining out the water. Such temporary solutions perpetuate the problem. The wise use of flood plains is based on a . different perception of this engineering task. We must change the existing priority (drain out all the water) and think about storing the water to the extent needed and only then drain out the surplus. The "finger pond" projects of Ugandan flood plains are a good example of what is needed here. The Ramsar bureau, along with the World Wildlife Fund and local governments, has initiated one of the most comprehensive wetlands conservation projects in the Kafue flats of Zambia . ... This project is aimed at the wise use of the flood plains of the river Zambezi, the Kafue flats, and along with the Ugandan experience, suggests an important strategy to deal with the wetlands programme for India, which has large, seasonally

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flooded plains, and millions of lesser mortals are forced to languish in sub-human conditions of submerged living. Flood plains are not yet included as wetlands of national importance. Yet, the unmistakable fact is that the flood plains of India pose one of the most important challenges to wetland thinkers. "From waterfowl to wise use" is how the Ramsar Convention, or for that matter, the mainstream wetland conservationists oriented themselves on the pressing matter of human survival But their perception is still inadequate. There is little campaign for communities ecologically handicapped by the wetlands. The World Health Organization (WHO) calls such people members of the "fourth world".

No Answers In the Sunderbans, for example, a number of fish seeds are destroyed because the locals only collect the prawn seeds and spoil the rest of their catch. There is concern only for the ecological impact of these activities. The local people are also aware of at least three other effects - the gradual damage to the river bank and bank forestry; diminishing conservancy of the river mouth because of the growing numbers of seed catchers; and, finally, the loss of species diversity in the estuaries. What receives little attention is the risk these poor people must take every day. Most families here have lost at least one member. No wetland study has inquired into these areas of human ignorance or sought answers that could save these people through an overall strategy of wetland conservation. The Philippines has done a good job c{f protecting the coastal fish population in one of its wetland wise use projects. The steps taken include creation of marine fish sanctuaries, stopping illegal fishing, use of dynamite and large trawler fishery. But 50

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it has failed to consider the occupational hazards of the poor fisher11aen who brave the seas, and deal with sea animals which are often caught in their nets and have to be let out then and there. Other environmental programmes such as forest conservation or improvement of urban living, however, include clear provisions for the well-being of the stressed communities. A WHO document, Spotlight on the Cities, clearly identifies the residents in need of particular attention. The "Fourth World" is a sub-proletariat "whose housing, sanitation, clothing and food are inadequate, whose cause is not championed by politicians and unions, who have limited info1111ation, education and voice; and who, because of indifference or intolerance, and the way they are affected by the law and by administrative practices, are systematically prevented from exercising the rights that other people take for granted". The Fourth World is invariably present in most of the wetland areas of the poorer parts of the world. Wetland conservation programmes, in the same manner, will have to recognise this Fourth World, its problems and their significance in using wetlands at a sustainable pace. These programmes will have to include definite provisions to project the interests of these l1a11dicapped communities drawing sustena11ce from wetland ecosystems and conserving th.e m at the same time. There should be clear guidelines to enable these people to reduce their risks and improving their conditions o~ living.

Tlie Statesman Deceniber 5, 1993

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8 CONSUMPTION INEQUITY AND NATURE CONSERVATION: CONFRONTING THE REBELLION OF NATURE It is imperative for the human race to transfo11r1 Nature but it has to honour a set of limits which dictate the transactions, or can also be known as the basic prerequisites of Nature conservation. The limits themselves are transient, depending upon the progressively improving scientific knowledge and traditional wisdom of Nature and Nature conservation. Over the last few decades, to sustain the infinite greed of the wealthy minority, resulting in shameful inequity in consumption patterns, most of these limits have been and are being systematically trespassed. As a result, and expectedly, Nature has aggressively retaliated and posed a serious threat to the entire humanity. . This presentation, however, is not focussed at measuring the extent of damages to Nature and society. It has, instead, examined the historical significance of the rebellion of Nature vis-a-vis the forward march of capitalism now set to globalise every avenue of plundering Nature and ignoring the dignity of the common people. It has concluded that no amount of environmental knowledge a11d activism will make enough sense to ensure sustainable living or bring enough success to the work of Nature conservation unless the matter of consumption inequity leading to fateful polarisation of the human society is comprehensively addressed. It has further proposed a global consultation on this sensitive and carefully avoided issue of fundamental human right and dignity. 52

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Exploitation: The Ecuador Syndrome It may be useful to discuss the phenomenon of 'exploitation' before we tum to focus on Nature's rebellion against over consumption. Exploitation is an unequal transaction. It falls under two basic categories. Exploitation within the society, of the humans by the humans, and exploitation of Nature. Both these fo111,s of exploitation have been unavoidable prerequisites for all the modes of production since the dawn of civilisation. Again, every event of exploitation carried out beyond the limit of tolerance (limits are rarely clearly visible) causes perturbation and may even lead to the collapse of the very system of which it is a part. Thus, exploitation is both unavoidable and a fatal act of humans in the existing social order and mode of production. In fact, exploitation pervades all the basic stages of development including input mobilisation, transfor111ation, output distribution and waste disposal . So ubiquitous is the presence of exploitation that giving examples will be a redundant exercise. There are relatively recent examples which combine exploitation of Nature and humans or for that matter combine social and natural environmental issues. (Footnote: Somalia etc) That the exploitation of Nature and of human takes place, both si1nultaneously and separately, is not known. Tl1e fact that is of some consequence is the absence of any real challenge to this system of exploitation. Altl1ough capitalism, the present world order, has itself been experiencing intermittent crises for having recorded progressively increasing inequity in consumption pattern, the system seems to be resilient enough to successfully thwart its collapse. In such a critical phase of history, when there is not enough action to stop the continuity of the order of consumption inequity, an unexpected challenge came from Nature. Lin1its 53

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to natural resources were exposed and Nature's inability to assimilate unlimited waste was demonstrated in so convincing a manner that these retaliations shook the world order more emphatically than any previous crisis of capitalism. Never before was it more apparent that continuing with the present gross inequity in consumption pattern would lead to unsustain·able -d evelopment and finally to the collapse of civilisation.

History, Ecology and Nature Exploitation engenders conflicts. Conflicts can be of three categories: those within and amongst the exploiters; those between the exploiters and the exploited; and finally, those among the exploited competing for the small number of opportun·ities allowed to a large number of eligible aspirants. Conflict resolution, therefore, is a basic agenda for human action .and an ordered assimilation of such experiences produces an authentic history of various groups, constituencies and regions. Secretary General U Thant's Report of 1969 presented to the UN General Assembly marked the beginning of a search for a comprehensive answer to the crisis emerging from relations of humankind with the environment. The report noted that threatening signs were visible long ago - demographic explosion, inadequate integration of powerful technology with the requirement of environment, destruction of cultivated land, unplanned development of urban areas and the ever-growing danger of extinction of ma11y for111s of animal and plant life. On the basis of the report the UN General Assembly decided to hold a global conference on man and environment - a decision that led to the Stockholm conference in 1972. For millennia, observing the conflicts arising within the society was sufficient for understanding the basic historical process. 54

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Since the 1970s, humans realised that Nature could no longer be taken for granted and environmental issues relating to the misuse of Nature were prominently discussed and a new frame of reference for the study of history fell contingent. No longer was it sufficient to understand the basic agenda of human action only by observing the conflicts occurring within the society. Conflicts with Nature began to dictate the course of human history in a big way. It became imperative to include the study of conflicts with Nature to understand the history of humankind along with the study of conflicts taking place within society. Why this rebellion of Nature? There are two basic reasons. The poorer countries continued with uncontrolled growth of population and the rich countries continued with their phenomenal spree for improving their lifestyle. that needed more and more of Nature exploitation. Thus, when the population is doubling most rapidly, an average person in an industrial country consumes more than 4,800 kg of coal equivalent in his lifetime against a meagre 527 kg available for an average person in a developing country. And, therefore, the humans confront an adamant and threatening Nature. In a finite system perturbations are unavoidable if the boundaries are not respected. ~

Rebellion of Nature, since the seventies, has exposed the limitations of the classical definition of the history of mankind as the history of class struggle. It may be appropriate to define the history of humankind as the history of exploitation. Exploitation of Nature by humans and exploitation of humans by humans. Never before had the study of ecological history become so compelling. Never before had the rebellion of Nature become so conspicuous by threatening the prevailing order. This paper 55

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makes no pretensions to elaborate upon the subjective base of the study of ecological history. It will add only that it will be improper to identify the foundations of ecological history with that of deep ecology or the Geiga hypothesis. Ecological history is the dialectical appreciation of interrelationships between society and its surrounding environment with a central focus on understanding the Nature of conflicts along with the efforts to resolve them. Ecological history pins no faith on the rather naive approach of the early Greens, nor does it harbour the compulsive skepticism of structuralism. Ecological history will be a subjective tool for better understanding of the conflicts of present day problems of resource abuse and for reassessing the role of traditional practices for wiser use of Nature and natural ecosystems.

Protest Management Exploitation of humans exceeding a level of tolerance, results in protests. This is a natural human response. Expectedly, this behavioural response is well known to the exploiters. To encounter such protests a whole range of intellectual and experimental rigour has gone on largely in secret. Those who sponsor 'knowledge' did not perhaps desire the discipline of 'public response management' to be deliberated on in pubic. An example may explain the tool more convincingly. The incident took place within a metropolitan railway termi11us during period of prolonged social unrest. A commotion started during busy office hours wl1e11 a particular local trai11 reached the te1111inus with about 2000 commuters. The situation was ripe for taking a violent turn, for the passengers were unhappy with the behaviour of a policeman. At that time, a bearded person stood up on a packing box and delivered an exciting speech against the establishment. He condemned the rulers for keeping such traps for deliberately provoking the

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common people on non-issues while the actual task was to overthrow the regime. The lecture continued for about an hour, the crowd, meanwhile, gradually dissipated. This person was an officer of the intelligence department and was carrying out his official responsibility of staging a mock protest to take the steam off from the hyped up psyche of the commuters. The example demonstrates the strength of a 'planted protest' and the infinite potential of this tool in behavioural manipulation. It is only likely that the environmental movement is already infected with this PP (planted protest) virus and yet so little is discussed about it. The fundamental prerequisite for protest management is behavioural manipulation for dissipating the intention to protest or misdirecting the objective of protest. It is only natural that the normal response of the exploited man will be against the order of disparity causing progressively increasing imbalance. To retain an imbalance in favour of a few within a society, it is necessary to blunt the forces of reactive equilibrium inherent within the system. The caretakers of status quo of an unbalanced social system need essentially to maintain a continuously vigilant agenda to dump, buffer and confuse the spontaneous response of the masses, eager to reduce the imbalance. The sinister objective of this behavioural manipulation is to keep the masses unconscious or uncritical or perhaps not sufficie11tly co11scious a11d critical to recog11ise the ene1ny, or feel strong enough to protest. This is the social imperative of a rigged global order. After all, _if suddenly there are no juvenile delinquents, no prostitution, 110 gamblers, no bootleggers and clandestine buyers of liquors, if suddenly millions of the impoverished shake off tl1e effects of bron1ide and rise from their slumber, tl1e problem will not be for those 57

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who will rise but will be for those whose rights to enslave humanity gets challenged by the awakened. Ecology, interestingly, has been described as a subversive science to act as a subjective tool for the challengers. It is not true that the battle to save the planet is lost. On the contrary, and in spite of the efforts of the exploiters, there are examples of outstanding environmental movements which have been successful. In India few such landmarks which are immediately recognised will include Chipko, Silent Valley, the Bishnois and Sukhomajri water management project. This is nowhere near any complete list of many such efforts and movements which have been successful. A comprehensive agenda for action will be to provide a safety net to protect the population-at-risk from the danger of manipulated decisions and responses.

Perpetrating Plunder In modem times a quiet revolution has swept the world in the area of behavioural manipulation. Larger and larger comn1unities and target groups are adopting the specific psyche tailored for them by those who rule. In fact, those who run the system have perfected the art and science of dampening the legitimate human responses to assaults and seem to have obtained a decree to perpetuate the plunder. Effective use of the sa1ne tool of public response management is now visible arid is set to invade environmental movements too. That the rich 111inority dislikes pa11i11g with their illegitimate wealth is known to be a classical instinct of such humans. But the tendency of leading international environmental agencies set to make compromises with the desires of the rich minority cannot be chance directed. It is a matter of concern because such compromises will lead to tailor-made campaigns catering to \vhat can be termed as sponsored knowledge, where the 58

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environmentalists are expected to promote spontaneous, uninhibited for111 of knowledge of Nature, natural resources and their interaction with humans. It is a matter of concern, further, because the defeat of environmentalism will not end up in the victory of the rich minority who are enjoying at the expense of the common people; it will result in the collapse of civilisation. The rise of environmentalism is rooted in the unregulated exploitation of Nature. The rebellion of Nature against its rampant exploitation is the final signal before humanity to change its methods. Environmentalism aims at bringing this change and, therefore, no one can afford to dilute this objective and the actions thereof. In the above scheme of things, this discussion attempts to draw a pointed attention towards the rebellion of Nature and asks; why not a globa-1 convention on consumption inequity for adopting an agenda for ensuring every person a minimum standard of living and a rational share of natural resources. These two are the basic prerequisites for any person to live with dignity. Interestingly, many of the leading international NGOs active in the field of environment tend to yield to the requirements of the rich minority. This reluctance bears enough testimony that the work of psychic manipulation has not only scratched the surface of environmental movements but, in some cases, has also inflicted deep dents in the body polity. If this process is allowed to continue, environmental movements will take place in a manner and with an intensity wl1ich will suit the requirements of the rich minority.

Politics of Impoverishment Opportunities to use environmental agenda to further the interests of the rich minority are infinite. Any number of examples can be picked up to compile a directory of deceit 59

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on the people on this account. The time is ripe to bring these hidden coercions on humankind out in the open. One of the methods of doing so is to generate intensive discussion and deliberation on the basis of a central theme for campaign. In the present case, consumption inequity has been chosen to serve this purpose. Consumption inequity is a good indicator that simultaneously exposes the anarchy in resource sharing and the abuse of Nature. It includes the problems of poverty and development in addition. A fairly comprehensive measure for unsustainability. The proposed campaign will be misdirected and open to accommodating opportunism unless the objective of discussing consumption inequity is brought out clearly. It may be helpful to remember that avoiding the level of imbalance that causes the collapse of the sys_tem is also a goal for the exploiting minority. In fact, people must not be allowed to become so poor, said Professor Rein, "that they offend or are hurtful to society. It is not so much the misery and plight of the poor but the discomfort and cost to the community which is crucial to this view of poverty. We have a problem of poverty to the extent that low income creates problems for those who are not poor". The epistemological base of the exploiters is a system of optimised impoverishment. It is a state of living in • which the con1mon people will continue to survive and work efficiently for the lowest ter111s of labour. The portion of labour that remains t1npaid for is the source of rich people's wealth. Environn1entalists' concern for reducing consumption inequity is to save the planet, for which one has to respect the laws of Nature, limits of natural resources and Nature's ability to assimilate waste, the presence of a highly skewed consumption pattern is a direct assault on the dignity of those who are poorer, weaker and deprived. A highly imbalanced consumption 60

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pattern can never ensure the exploited majority a Iife of dignity. The reduction of consumption inequity is conceived as the campaign theme with the object of helping the deprived millions and ensure for them a life of dignity - a right that is conceded as fundamental in modem codes of governance. This is also the requirement of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development that expects states to reduce and eliminate unsustainable patterns of production and consumption and decrease the disparities in standards of living. Most political thoughts, religions and laws that exist uphold the concept of reducing consumption inequity and ensuring a life with dignity for all. The proposed global consultation can effectively draw support from all such institutions and individuals and then reach a s~t of restrictions, regulations and compensations for every signatory country to adhere to and, thereby, help serve the planet thwart the impending threats from the abuse of Nature. Therefore, why can there not be a global consultation on consumption inequity?

Towards a New Solidarity One of the most significant changes taking place in the 21 st century will be that most public decisions are going to become business decisions. Wealthier countries, where the centre of inten1ational economic power is invariably located, are taking comprehensive steps towards such an end of which forcing structural adjustments in poorer countries traditional economic order has been a major one. A WWF-Intemational study by David Reed has observed that structural adjustments are resulting in further polarisation of wealth, fostering inequity in consumption patterns and an increased assault on natural resources. From the standpoint of environmental concern the world can be divided into two groups of countries, the over consuming 61

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countries and the low consumption countries. Over consuming countries are hostile to Nature conservation and sustainable development of the world as a whole, whereas low consumption countries are far less stressful on Nature, and are more often than not forced to assault Nature and environment to keep things better for their wealthier and over consuming counterparts. The proposed ecological divide of the world is likely to assist environmental thinking for having a more reliable foothold. · The scenario is fairly transparent. On the one side we have fewer people with eno111,ous financial powers while on the other is the vast multitude of human resource virtually without any economic levers. If the majority of the population in low consumption countries are able to understand their problems and can locate their enemy, then the strength and might of their wealthier counterparts could be adequately tested. It has been discussed earlier that the centres of international power are quite seized with this basic sense of history. ~ey make every necessary arrangement to keep the people away from understanding their problems by diverting and diffusing the voices of transparency, righteousness and entitlement. What they need is a commensurate stock of docile and corruptible people who will be allowing smooth passage to deceit and extortion. Structural adjustments are, in fact, a part of this basic structural approach - a paradigm for keeping people away from the problems. Can we, on behalf of the low consuming countries, suggest an alternative paradigm of keeping the problems away from the people - the 'non-structural' approach, if we may call it? Instead of diverting and diffusing the areas of disorder it will concentrate and focus on them to upgrade the knowledge and mental quality of the common people to make it strong enough 62

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to debate and resist the attempts of the superpowers to rob them of their dignity and basic rights of protecting their environmental and natural resources. A call to consult together on the issue of consumption inequity will also provide an opportunity for building up a new solidarity. Solidarity of the millions of victims of ecological assault across the world. The solidarity will rest upon a dedicated fraternity of missionaries for a better environmental order. Solidarity for a better environmental order will not need to embark upon a whole new set of ideas or methods to construct and pursue its agenda. Fundamentally, it will need to recognise a few simple things that are jeopardising the sustainability of the entire humanity. One has to see that it is impossible to reconcile in the same global order the twenty-fold difference in energy utilisation by the wealthy minority at the expense of a hapless majority. One has to see further the undercurrent of pauperisation that leaves enough money to buy guns but not enough to feed the chi Id. In 1926, Bertrand Russell said, "If all the existing methods are used and tested methods applied then in one generation we could produce a world which would be free from corruption, hatred and malevolence. But we do not do it because we want oppression and war." Unless we prove Russell wrong our efforts in Nature conservation and sustainable development will go little beyond cosmetic worth. This is not a place to suggest the principles of building a new solidarity. The minimum that is intended here is a scope for consultation on consumption inequity among various countries and people of the same country. The consultation will be a counter measure against tl1e forces of disruption. Consumption inequity becomes the prime indicator to the abuse . of Nature and also to the lack of rationale in resource distribution and ownership. The proposed consultation among 63

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well info1111ed state representatives can meticulously deal with the status of different levels of consumption imbalances prevailing in society and suggest restrictions, disciplines and compensations for gradually narrowing down the inequity and restore the dignity of living for every human. The responsibility of holding such a consultation should ideally lie with the United Nations. This will be in furtherance of the Principle 8 to be read with Principle 5 of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, desiring states to take steps to reduce and eliminate unsustainable patterns of consumption. These principles also require states to cooperate in the essential task of eradicating poverty in order to decrease the disparities in standards of living and for better meeting the needs of the majority of the peoples of the world.

References: Russell, B. On Education ( 1926) Pepper, D. Modern Environmentalism (London, Routledge, 1996)

Bramwell, A. The Fading of the Greens (Lo11do11, Yale U,iiversitv Press /994) •

Human Development Report (for UNDP, · Del/ii, Oxford, /995)

This paper was prepared for the World Philosophers' Meet (24th - 30th November 1996, Pone, India).

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9 TURNING AROUND FOR A COMMUNITY-BASED WASTEWATER TREATMENT AND RESOURCE RECOVERY OPTION •

Where is the wisdom that we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information? The cycles of heaven an twenty centuries, Bring us fartMr from God and nearer to dust. - T S Eliot

Introduction The Calcutta wetlands were being studied since 1981 for their significance in wastewater reuse in successive clusters of fish ponds and agricultural fields. By 1985, when the Ganga Action Plan was launched it was possible for the present worker to moot a pr~posal to introduce the wetland option in place of conventional sewage treatment plants, drawn on the basis of the Calcutta wetland experience .. It took three years for the Ganga Project Directorate to approve this farmer-centered proposal for replacing the conventional sewage treatment plants. In the first phase designs were submitted for Titagarh, Bally and Panihati municipalities (each with. more than 100,000 population) . •

Initially, the proposed pond system was double-celled. It waspresumed that subsequent cell divisions would be made according to the availability of wastewater in the treatment 67

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plant. This design was appropriately modified by a project appraisal mission of the Ganga Project Directorate into a conventional multiple cell pond system comprising anaerobic, facultative and maturation tanks. However total water area in both the cases remained nearly the same because in both cases it was calculated on the basis of provisions laid down in the design manual of the Union government. The wetland system is designed ·on the basis of two principal fo, 11,s of farmer participation viz., pisciculture and agriculture. .With this, other forms of agriculture and agro-forestry can be integrated and accommodated after appropriate assessment. The increase in supply of wastewater will change both the area covered and Nature of reuse practices. While the area under effluent irrigated regime will be on the rise, the one under pisciculture within the stabilisation pond system will gradually decline. However fish culture will be possible in private ponds within the command area of effluent irrigation. In fact, construction of new storage ponds within the command area (particularly when it is a wetland region) will open a whole lot of opportunities to upgrade the local resource base.

The Wetland Option Incorporation of the advantages of the natural biological process and principles of ecological regulation has lately been . . attempted to develop a new generation of environmentally sound engineering designs. Using wetland functions both for reducing wastewater pollution and reuse of nutrients is an example of such an effort which h~ opened new areas of research and application also in other parts of the world also. In India, the launching of the Ganga Action Plan provided the necessary fund and opportunity to experiment with the new generation options in municipal wastewater treatment. 68

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The Ganga Action Plan has provision for resource recovery. However, the basic difference between the conventional wastewater treatment plant and the proposed pond system option is that resource recovery is suggestive in the fo111aer while it is obligatory in the latter. In the latter it is an integral component of the design for111ing the very basis of its community linkage. The present project is an outcome of one of the earliest effort • in developing community- based technology for river sanitation. Here the conventional option in wastewater treatment has been replaced by an ecological design in which the task of reducing pollution and reusing nutrients is linked with enhancement of food security and development of livelihood of the local community using nutrient-enriched effluent in fisheries and agriculture. The actual design is based on a pragmatic manipulation of natural function within the existing framework of policy and regulatory controls. As stated earlier, pond areas are calculated on the basis of widely used guidelines for designing stabilisation ponds (anaerobic, facultative and maturation - diagram on pg.-75). However, introducing culture of fish in the admissible water area improves the efficiency of the system. This is because : • The fish population acts . as an ecological manipulator by grazing on the algal population which would have otherwise caused algal bloom and · Apart from the good revenue that is ea-r ned by the implementing agency by giving license to use the water area for pisciculture, fish production brings adequate entrepreneurial incentive to operate th·e system efficiently and productively.

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•

Basic features of wetland option will be : • Environmentally sound design •

· Reliability • Decentralised manage1.ae.1t and decision making • Resource mobilisation and enabling • Stronger livelihood support

E11viro11~ntallJ Sound Dn~n Wastewater po~ are basically solar reactors and complete most of their biocher,1ical reactions with the help of solar • energy. Reduction of biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) takes place because of a ·unique p.henomenon of algae-bacteria symbiosis where energy is drawn from algal photosynthesis. Therefore, consumption of conventional energy is minimised. •

The wetland project is a flexible systc111. Any sewage treatment facility is des.igned on the basis of a projected population (a 20-years projection is usual). It is natural that the design flow cannot be reached at the beginning. The flow will steadily rise to the design value in course of the projected lifespan. It has been f-ound Jhat converitionat be.1111,ent plants suffer from non-availability of -sewage and in many cases continuous recirculation of effluent wastewater becomes unavoidable rendering the faci~ity much more enttgy expensive. lntegtated wetland system on the ·other hand, can work w.ith a1most a no-flow condition to a ful1-flow condition with uniform proficiency and minor :adj-ustnV"Afs. Wastewater ponds can ensure more efficient removal of colifor111s. Conventional mechanical sewage treatment plants (tricking filters or activated sludge plants) are largely incfficBt in removing coliform bacteria. (Coliform is the indicator species for ·faecal bacteria which are likely to be pathogeaic}. 7-0

•

•

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Rtliability

The pond system projects are much more reliable and have longer life-span of the treatment facility. The conventional sewage treatment plants are prone to damage and frequent breakdowns. A huge financial liability accrues to the parent municipal authority to properly maintain such treatment plants. Unl_ess continuous financial assistance can be arranged from outside no municipal body in the low income countries can afford to run conventional mechanical sewage treatment plants. Resource recovery systems, on the other hand, are a revenue earner. For the purpose of fund allotment municipal responsibility for all practical purposes ends at the pumping station from where the wastewater flows to the pond system by gravity. Ponds are wealth generating ecosystems and proper management can not only make the system self-reliant but adequately profitable. Furthe1·111ore, being a non-structural option, the problem of damage and breakdown hardly arises and the system can continue to work for any length of time without any major system disorder. . In fact these projects need much less construction time. Time of completion of any conventional mechanical sewage treatment plant will be around five years if not more. For economies with inflationary pressure the time taken for construction escalates the price considerably. In the present case, projects can be completed within 18 months and the impact of inflation on the total project cost is noticeably lower than that for the conventional projects. •

Decentralised Ma,iagement and Decision Making

An outstanding feature of the wetland projects which are completed is that these institutionalise participation of the stakeholders. Agenda-21 has laid particular emphasis on 71

Welfare Ecology

institutionalising . participation of the stakeholders in environment improvement projects to ensure decentralised management and decision making. For conventional mechanical sewage treatment plants such an opportunity is marginal. On the contrary, for wetland projects, institutionalisation of local people's participation at all major levels of planning, construction and particularly maintenance is a basic need for successfully running the system. After completion of the projects, it has been possible to give the local rural authorities the responsibility of the day-to-day maintenance of the system.

Resource Mobilisati.on and Enabling •

Resource mobilisation and enabling contributes to rural development. Integrated wetland · projects have a significant role in rural resource mobilisation. Completion of the projects trigger a chain of economic activities by providing enriched irrigation water in addition to the piscicultural units which f01111 a part of the system. In West Bengal there are examples of rejuvenated rural economy developed within a short time of completion and start-up of wetland projects.

Stronger Uvelihood Support The pond system option compulsorily includes pisciculture, agriculture, horticulture and animal husbandry. All these systems have a common and rich nutrient base that is drawn from municipal wastewater. Unlike in the conventional sewage treatment facility productivity of these multiple food growing systems goes a long way to render strong support towards the development of livelihood of the farmer families. The conventional sewage treatment plant is invariably considered an extemality in the basic social and economic activities of a city and its fringe. 72

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The wetland option is least expensive and is estimated to cost less than Rs 30 lakh (about US $70,000 by 1998 levels) per million litre of wastewater per day. This includes the cost of land. The major cost of the project is that of the land which should preferably be a low lying area at the fringe of a municipal boundary. These lands are generally the cheapest and in most cases do not raise more than one crop per year. It is possible to engage displaced farmers in the wetland project for their continuous source of income that can even be more than the amount earned by them before the implementation of the project. In fact choosing a wetland option will be easier for the cities with a low-lying waterlogged fringe. It is also true that cities in general grow on raised lands and occasionally around a city's fringe there are some low-lying waterlogged areas. Dhaka, Mumbai, Jakarta, Calcutta and Bangkok are only a few of such cities with marshy backyards. What however is unique in the wetlands of Calcutta is the development of a traditional practice of wastewater reuse spread over more than 12,000 hectares - the largest of its king in the world. A large part of the "folk technology" applied here is still retained in an oral tradition. If a vast metropolitan city's sewage can be treated and reused by a traditional practice there is no reason to hesitate in imagining that municipalities can be self-sustaining in their task of sanitation by adopting the wetland option. This is where the challenge begins.

limitations of the Conventi.onal Approach In 1978, a World Bank IDRC report expressed the limitations of the so called universal approach to municipal sanitation in developing countries using conventional sewage treatment plants and in fact recommended a "new approach" that will be location specific and based on natural biological processes. 73

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A closer observation brings out three basic limitations of the conventional mechanical sewage treatment plant design which

are: · Affordability · Reliability • Weakness in theory

A/fordabi/,ity Municipal expenses in developing countries are mostly to cope with a shoestring budget. Services like water supply, maintenance of roads and solid waste disposal necessarily receive more priority than sanitation facility. It is no wonder that very few municipalities in our country can be provided with a sewage treatment plant facility that is capital intensive and needs considerable amount of recurring expenses. In addition · to · being capital intensive the mechanical sewage treatment plant consumes non-renewable energy to carry out the biological processes of wastewater purification.

Reliability Conventional mechanical sewage treatment plants are highly sensitive to standards of plant maintenance and uncertainty in availability of wastewater. In hot and humid climates the chances of corrosion are higher and demand frequent changes of treatment plant components in spite of regular maintenance. It is not unusual to find non-functioning sewage treatment plants or cosmetic maintenance programmes impressing the visitors who matter. The perfor11,ance of mechanical sewage treatment plants is also affected by uncertainties in wastewater loading. In most cases it talces a long time to bring the amount of wastewater flow for which plants are designed. In Howrah district, West Bengal, hardly · any flow reached the sewage 74

Welfa~ Ecology

IN I EGRATED WETLAND SYSTEM FOR WASTEWATER TREATMENT AND REUSE UNDER CONTINUOUS FLOW CONDITION SHALLOW WASTE WATER PONDS 14-1-----PRE-TR ATMENT-----~

-

ANAEROBIC PGID

~ . _ FACY!.TATIYE POND

,.4~ RECOVERY NUTRIENT~

RECYaJNG POND -

FULL LOAD CONDITION

~ - - NulRIENT RECOVERY---

♦ANAEROBIC PON0+14-t-----RECYCLING PONDS----1~•1

HALF LOAD CONDITION

•

75

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treatment plant for I O initial years. This caused a huge additional expenditure to revive the plant and bring it back to operational condition.

Weakness in Theory The theoretical pedestal of sewage treatment plant design has remained one-sided for not having considered local practices in wastewater use in fisheries and agriculture as a source of knowledge. This has happened because the blueprints essentially grew on the drawing table of western specialists who had no perception of a completely different world of the east, which has a bounty of sunshine and impoverished people. Most of the local practices in the hot climates ·developed because the poorer people knew how to enhance the productivity in fisheries or agricultural field by using wastewater flowing out of the cities. That the condition of living in the poorer parts of the world is different and an entire set of risk assessment has an altogether a different perspective are facts that very few specialists of rich countries will be able to genuinely perceive. This ·inherent one-sidedness of the subjective base of conventional sewage treatm~nt plant option has at least two debilitating manifestations: • Lack of perspective · Top-down approach In recent times the significance of resource recovery has found place in the guidelines for designing sewage treatment plants. However the concept still continues to be one·of the suggestive paths rather than a compulsory objective. Therefore resource recovery remains a desirable goal but not a compulsory • obligation.

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For the same lack of objectivity, the design of sewage treatment plants continues entirely to rely upon a "top-down" approach. The cost of this denial of the knowledge of community experience is borne by the society whereas the proponent of incomplete technology rules the roost. For all these reasons sewage treatment plants become alien monuments of sanitation where the community does not find any immediate effect of its perfo1111ance or lack of it.

Calcutta Wetland Practice In the wetlands to the east of Calcutta wastewater is used in fisheries and agriculture covering an area of about 12,000 hectares. This was mapped by the present author in 1995 while working with the State Planning Board of the government of West Bengal. The area has been described as the waste recycling region. It has three sub-regions. There are farms growing vegetables on a garbage substrate and are uniquely planned with alternate bands of garbage filled lands and channel ponds. The ponds were filled with sewage twice a year. After allowing for suitable detention time the treated sewage is used for irrigating the garbage fields for growing vegetables. In a report published on this system in 1986, the average daily production of vegetables was found to be 150 tonnes. The same ponds also grow fish fingerlings on a commercial basis. These are among the earliest sewage-fed fisheries in the world and started around the tum of the century. The second sub-region consists of the fish ponds. Wastewater from the city flows through the fish ponds after being det~ned for a few days for the process of bio-degradation of organic components of the wastewater to take place. Organic loading rate in these fish ponds appears to vary between 20 kg and

77

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70 kg per hectare per day (in the fo1111 of biochemical oxygen demand). There is a network of channels which supplies untreated sewage and drains out the used water. The last subregion comprises paddy fields that use the effluent from fish ponds to grow more than one crop a year. Here there are some fish ponds that do not have any access to untreated sewage and therefore use the spent water from upstream fish ponds. To a planner an alternative concept that is less capital intensive than the traditional resource recovery practice of east Calcutta and yet gives the best desired benefits is seldom available. This is particularly true when the search is for an ecologically acceptable choice. The fish pond ecosystem of east Calcutta is one of such none-too-frequent examples in environmental protection and development management which is in ha1111ony with Nature and benefits are achieved at a much lower cost. From this we can · learn, examine and adopt elsewhere. What however is more striking that how easily the complex ecological process has been adopted by poor farmers of the wetlands of Calcutta. These natural ecologists have developed such a mastery of the resource recovery activities that they are easily growing fish at a yield rate and a production cost which are unmatched in any other freshwater fish ponds of the country. It is always true that the culture of conserving a resource and using it as many.times and in as many ways as possible has been seen to thrive among the poor. There is prima facie an inverse relationship between affluence and affinity with recycling. Most of the discoveries in waste reuse over which scientists in advanced countries congratulate each other are likely to have been perceived and used much before in the villages of the less developed parts of the world. Understanding the Calcutta system of resource recovery is far from being complete. There is no reason to pretend that the 78

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theoretical guidelines for translating the experience of traditional wetland practice into a reliable technology option is foolproof.

In fact, the subjective tool of a pond system option for treatment and reuse of wastewater is far more crude than conventional .hard system choices. Yet from the standpoint of ecological balance, economic viability and system reliability, the f01111er towers much above the latter in its rustic grace and is destined to shape the future grammar of sanitation technology options for tropical countries, especially the poorer ones.

Redefin_..g Objective Major objectives for the implementation of wetland system project include • Ensuring steady availability of wastewater in the pond system and maintenance of required hydraulic regime • Ensuring sufficient reduction of pollutants and appropriate cultural condition for growth of fish in the admissible water area within the constructed waterbodies of the project '

• Ensuring appropriate distribution of nutrient-enriched effluent from the pond system and a wise choice of competing uses o( the water; • Prevention of any increase of waterlogging during monsoon that may be the cause by construction of pond dykes • Obstructing natural flow of monsoon runoff ~

• Minimising unutilised. flow of wastewater • Increasing areas of. community interface and providing for involvement of stakeholder • Ensuring continuous and comprehensive monitoring of selected indicators for appraising the operating conditions and perfor111ance level of the project system 79

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• Cultivation of understanding within the local community, knowledgeable people, village leaders and other -groups of stakeholders and individuals

Two Lessons in Strategy for a Farmer-Centered Approach To replicate the Calcutta wetland model the initial task is two-fold - building a strategy to adopt a farmer centered approach and developing an ecological design for reducing pollution and reuse of nutrients using existing guidelines and the engineering no,111s of wastewater treatment and minor irrigation projects. Emphasis here has been given to build a strategy for developing a fanner-centered approach on the basis of umpteen themes that are hidden in the age-old practice of using wastewater by the local farmers of the wetlands of Calcutta. It may be recalled that farmer- centered approach in Agenda 21 has been hailed as the key to "attainment of sustainability in both developed and developing countries". Therefore, the significance of an appropriate strategy to pursue a fanner-centered approach can hardly be overstressed. A welldefined strategy ensures suitable distribution of roles to be played by the implementing agency 3:nd the participating community. Accordingly, two basic lessons in developing an appropriate strategy have been comprehended and are discussed below: h

Strategy for Enhancing Food Security and Improvement of Uvelihood It involves the following components: • Means to achieve • Basin-wise strategy and command area planning • Capitalising on the uncertainties in wastewater loading 80

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,

• Reference situation appraisal

I

Means to Achieve

,

There can be two different means to achieve the desired reduction of pollutants and trapp_ing of nutrients using wetland functions. · '

These are: • Flow-through system

~

• Abstracted flow system.

When sufficient land is available (public land or through community c9nsensus) it may be advantageous to go for abstracted flow approach. On the other hand, when the land is relatively scarce, flow-through system will ~e the unavoidable choice.

I I '

\

In the flow-through system the entire amount of -wastewater is held in a series of ponds, at first for treatment and then for growing fish. Subsequently, the effluent is used· for irrigation purposes in the downstream areas. Whereas in the abstracted flow system, wastewater is directly drawn from the outfall channel or receptacle streams to be used for growing fish and then for irrigation. The advantage of this system is that the user can draw the water according to his requirements. •

Basin-wide Strategy and Command Area Planning ,

l

r

The conventional design of effluent disposal from wastewater treatment plant requires the nearest available stream for designing the outfall channel. This approach overlooks the resource recovery opportunities through effluent irrigation in agriculture. Some basic inf01111ation on the topographical details of the sub-basin in which the trec;itment plant is situated is 81

Welfare Ecology •

required for planning. On such a basin map appropriate layout of the field channel will have to be finalised. The necessity of an outfall channel is mainly for disposal of unused effluent and monsoon overflow. •

Depending upon the availability of wastewater the provisional boundary of the command area using pond system effluent for irrigation purpose can be delineated. It will be wiser to have successively bigger command areas in phases according to the incremental nature of the availability of wastewater. This has been discussed in detail in the following section.

Capitalising on the Uncertainty in Wastewater Loading . Wastewater treatment plants are designed for a projected future population and during initial yeas, therefore,· the _flow is not supposed to be available in .full. In subsequent years the flow is likely to increase in stages before finally reaching the design flow. Apart from the populatioi:i which is growing with time, there are some other technical factors for which the availability of flow in the newly completed treatment plan~s can be fairly lean during initial years. ·For conventional mechanical sewage treatment plan_ts the inadequacy in availability of wastewater loading is a cause of serious· concern and adversely affects the perfo11nance of the plant. However the wetland option is designed to perfo1111 in a manner that makes the best possible use of the unavoidable feature capitalising on the phenomenon of uncertainty and the incremental nature of flow. During the initial years the available flow in many cases is less than one third of the designed flow. This m~ans the detention time allowed in the anaerobic pond is increased to three days instead of one day. Therefore the· effluent from the anaerobic pond is most likely to .reduce the BOD of the 82

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wastewater · below admissible level to grow fish. Anaerobic ponds are assumed to reduce BOD load by 50 per cent for a • detention time of 24 hours. In such cases fish culture is possible in all facultative ponds in addition to the maturation ponds. By increasing the admissible water area for pisciculture the authority is able to raise revenue from the fish producer while the fish producer for having produced more fish will have more profit. Subsequently with the increase in availability of flow, admissible water area can be gradually red'1ced (fish can be grown in one out of two facultatite tanks in the second phase). Concu11ently there will ·be an increase in the command area where effluent irrigation can be arranged and the number of beneficiaries from the project will also increase. It is quite likely that villagers can introduce effluents in their own ponds and augment the production of fish in the command area. By adopting a phased system of effluent distribution and available water area for pisciculture a major cause for concern in managing conven_tional sewage treatment plants has been effectively changed to the ·advantage of enh_ancing food security and livelihood development of the poorer sections of society. Reference Situation Appraisal

The integrated wetland system project is expected to have a positive impact on the existing resource base around the project area by providing nutrient enriched water to grow more food and plants and create auxiliary facilities. A reliable appraisal of the initial status of the resource base and livelihood of the target community will enable evaluation of the nature of changes th~t may subsequently take pl!1ce. For reference situation appraisal studies should be carried out in the following aspects: 83

Welfare Ecology

· Topography • Species diversity • Wastewater quality • Existing fanning practices • Health and livelihood the target community

Strategy /or Implementing the Project Strategy for implementing the project will involve the following components • Management rationalisation • Institutionalisation of stakeholders' participation • Enabling

Management Rationalisation Unlike water treatment plants, non-performance of ccnventional sewage treatment plants does not res·u lt in immediate community response. Neither is there any scope to provide incentive for excellence in perfo1111ance. In such situations the task of plant management becomes more difficult and it is hardly surprising that satisfactory management of sewage treatment plants, in the kind of work culture that prevails here, has been a goal difficult to achieve. In contrast, if the pond system fails to perfo11r1 properly there may be irregularities in effluent distribution and in such cases the fanners, who are expecting the water, are sure to register their protest. On the other hand, the better the maintenance of the wastewater ponds the more the yield of fish and resultant profit from sale in addition to other ·benefits that will accrue to the community (See flow chart on next page). 84

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.SYSTEM

IIANAGEIIENT

'

IIIPAOVED YIELD

.

REGULAR SUPPLY

ANDFtSH PRODUCTIVITY

OFNUIRIENT ENRICHED EFFLUENT TO AGRICULTURE

MORE PROFIT

PUBLIC PROTEST

WelfareEcoloa'

Thus, in the proposed wetland option for wastewater treatment the management 111ecllanism has undergone a complete change where non-perfo1t1aance is linked with community protest and .. good performance has incentive in the form of increased profit.

Institutionalisation of Stakeholders' Participation _ . One of the few areas finding repeated emphasis in Agenda-21 is the need for institutionalisation of stakeholder S participation in imple111enting and managing community facilities. Not many development projects, however~ which are being designed these days, include this vital provision of Agenda-21 as one of the objectives to achieve. .

.

4

In the wetland option discussed here, the task of institutionalisation is achievable. For example, there is a for 111al sharing of task with the local panchayat authorities in management of the pond system and distribution of nutrientenriched effluent for irrigation. The panchayat officials can also perform the task of identifying appropriate fish producers (individual, group or cooperative) to whom the implementing authority gives the licensing rjght for carrying out pisciculture in the admissible water areas. . The licensee in turn, pays license fee to the implementing authority. Major stakeholders' groups will ·include .

· Implementing agency • Local panchayat • Beneficiaries and other interest groups The partnership which can be developed in implementing the wetland option will be of a networking nature rather than 86

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hierarchic. There can be involvement of all the three groups or between any two of them. For example the panchayat can levy water charges on the far 111er families for reaching the nutrient enriched effluent in the field channel. Similarly, technical infor11aation regarding water quality can be ot1tained by the users directly from the implementing agency without any role for panchayats in-between. As most of the components of the wetland option, the process of institutionalisation of stakeholders' participation is also dynamic in nature and with the passage of time things are likely to improve considerably in the light of the experience gained and the lessons learnt.

Enabling

are

Conventional sewage treatment plants not designed to promote resource mobilisation. The wetland option, on the cont, ary, provides immediate opportunity to attract local investment and entrepreneurial interest in fisheries and agroforestry. Again these new entrepreneurial efforts are likely to have multiplier effects on resource mobilisation as a whole. Enabling appropriate entrepreneurs has indeed been deemed to be an important feature of the wetland option and holds key to the sustainability of the project.

Looking Ahead In Agenda 21 a growth pattern has been envisaged that will be environmentally sound and will ensure inter-generational equity. This is considered absolutely essential to relieve the great poverty that is deepening in the developing world. But this hope for the future of humanity is conditional on decisive political action that should now begin managing environmental resources to ensure both sustainable human progress and survival. In the proposed wetland option wastewater is 87

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considered as an environmental resource instead of the conventional technology approach of treating it as a pollutant. It clearly meets the engineering challenge of finding a growth model to ensure social welfare and a sustainable future. From the capital intensive and non-viable options of the past, the time is ripe to switch over to an ecological alternative where availability of funds need not be a constraint. Municipal sanitation programmes in many cases are linked with multinational bank finance. It is therefore an obligation of the funding agencies to appreciate the United Nations mandate on searching for technology options to replace nonviable junk-yard packages. They invariably help the vested interests at the global as well as local levels with little or no improvement in the quality of life of the common people in whose name such finance is sought and who ultimately bear the debt burden. Calcutta's resource recovery practice is a tutorial ecosystem for others and is a pointer towards the future grammar of river sanitation in the poorer countries. Nevertheless, -institutionalising community involvement and . stakeholder's participation is a recent concept in project planning, design and implementation of development projects. Although it is a preferred approach to enhance ecological security it has not been found to be easily achievable. It will need deeper understanding of the kinds of interest which bind various individual groups and market forces for finding reliable guidelines to implement a community-based approach. Immediate barriers to a community-based approach may therefore be traced from the following facts: .

C

• Prevailing top-down approach neither has enough provision for consultation at the community level nor provides adequate scope for exchanging and infusion of community wisdom

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• Top-down approach assigns specialists as the key personnel, but community based approach essentially needs facilitators. This is the kind of a perceptual change that does not easily come to the classical mindset of the development promoters • Community based approach draws the specialists much close to · the problem and makes them much more answerable to the people and at times the experiences can be difficult. This is not the usual milieu that the specialists are accustomed to • Community based approach is not as yet appropriately developed to restrict the degree of involvement within a pragmatic domain. Theoretically the involvement can keep on extending with a definite risk of far too many views to drive at a consensus. This may lead to new conflicts and even political overtones that might result in feeding the entire effort into futility Community involvement at the level of planning and design can, at times, open up completely different approaches to reach the objective of the project. The existing frame of working may not always be so flexible as to negotiate such wide range of conceptual variations in project planning and design.

References Ghosh, Dhrubajyoti., Sewage Treatment Fisheries in East Calcutta Wetlands., Report to rlie Department of Fisheries, Government of West Bengal, Calcutta, India, 1983

Ghosh, Dhrubajyoti & Furedy, Christine. Resource Conserving Traditions and Waste Disposal: The Garbage Farms and Sewage-fed Fisheries of Calcutta. Conservation and Recycling, Vol. 7, No 2-4, 1984 89

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Ghosh, Dhrubajyoti. Cleaner Rivers: The Least Cost Approach. State Planning Board, Government of West Bengal, 1985 Ghosh, Dhrubajyoti, and Sen, Susmita. Ecological History of Calcutta's Wetland Conservation, Environmental • • Conservation, Vol. 14. No 3, 1987 Ghosh, Dhrubajyoti. Ecosystem Approach to Low-cost Sanitation in India, Where the People Know Better. Proceedings of the International Conference on Ecological Engineering for Wastewater Treatment, Sweden, 1991. Ghosh, Dhrubajyoti & Sen, Susmita. Developing Waterlogged Areas for Urban Fishery and Waterfront Recreation Project Ambio, Journal of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Vol 21, No 2 1992 Ghosh, Dhrubajyoti. Ecosystem Approach to Wastewater Management in Urban Areas - Lessons for Poorer Countries with Ample Sunshine. International Workshop on Integrated Water Resources Managenient in Urban and Surrounding Areas, International Hydrological Programme of UNESCO, Essen, 1994. Ghosh, Dhrubajyoti. Integrated Wetland System (IWS) for Wastewater Treatment and Recycling. Basic Manual. US Agency for International Development, 1995. Ghosh, Dhrubajyoti. To~·ards Sustai,iable Development of the Calcutta Wetlands; Towards the Wise Use of Wetla,uls, T S Davis, Ed., Ramsar Convention 1993.

90

10 CONSERVING THE WATER REGIME FOR AN ECOLOGICALLY SUBSIDISED CITY AN ENVIRONMENTAL AGENDA FOR CALCUTTA Introduction In course of the last · few decades, a new concern has been found to rock a number of basic assumptions in development planning and current modes of human living. This has been the concern for environment - environment of the people on this earth. There is enough warning against taking Nature for granted. Simultaneously, it is in the urban areas, where every second earthling is going to live in the near future, that some of the major interferences with Nature are taking place at a rapid pace. It is no wonder that urban areas are increasingly • getting more attention for their mounting conflicts with Nature . • At international parlours one can also find two other areas of emphasis in planning for urban environmental improvement and restoration. Firstly, to recognise the significance of ameliorating urban poverty or allowing a focused attention towards the population at risk and secondly, to introduce participatory and community-based approach in implementing environmental projects. The Earth Summit has provoked local level efforts for preparing the environmental agenda. In fact in the recent past, urban planners in India have started reorienting themselves to. incorporate environmental concerns 91

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within their work ambit. Urban people's environment is gaining attention at the highest places where decisions are made. Changing priorities have already opened the gate for liberal investment in the area of urban environmental improvement. Research in the field is also gaining momentum. For good reasons, the major emphasis for improving the urban peoples' environment is being laid around the hotspots - the megacities in India. Nevertheless, in many ways, the present environmental qualities of these mega cities have remained frightening. Calcutta, which is amongst the foremost megacities of the world, legitimately draws attention to it in this emerging area of global environmental concern. The concern for urban peoples' environment has resulted in both intensive and extensive studies in many parts of the . world. A new set of info1111ation is changing the order or priorities in the existing planning process. Old assumptions are lost to new ones. New priorities in planning are allowing advanced management methods and technologies to grow along with compatible policy and regulatory support. Requirements of all these projects are obvious because they provide access to essential conditions of urban living collectively constituting a friendly environment for _the residents of the city (See Table- I on next page).

Caring For the Water Regime While conventional sectoral initiatives will be of great significance, it is also true that all of them taken together will not be enough to sustain the city. Cities draw·upon natural resources and it is on these matters of transaction that precise understanding necessary to ensure ecological security. Such understanding falls under the realm of urban· ecology. 92

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Table 1:

Minimum action points for the improvement and restoration of Calcutta's environment through conventional sectoral initiatives. •

I.

Provision of safe and adequate water, equitable distribution throughout the city

2.

Safe disposal of city waste particularly those w-hich are polluted or hazardous ·

3.

Renovation of collapsed underground sewers ...

\

•

4.

Provision of better, wider, cleaner and dust free ·roads with regulated traffic

5.

Provision of comfortable and affordable mass transit system (road, rail and waterways) for all

6. •

Provision of safe and adequate food an~ medicine and reliable health care for all at affordable cost

7.

Reduction of automobile pollution and city noise

8. · Improvement of quality of shelter for the poor 9.

Preservation of waterbodies and lakes;

I0. Preserving and upgrading parks, gardens :and other , open spaces.

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The uniqueness of Calcutta lies in its having a friendly water regime. This includes the system of wise use.of wetlands for wastewater treatment and reuse in fisheries and agriculture, a facilitating river jacket for water supply and drainage and • then a copious groundwater supply. It is no wonder that the city can be te1111ed as an ecologically subsidised city for having to spend nothing towards the treatment of about 800 million litres of wastewater flowing out daily. Yet, all the three comp-onents of this unique water regime are under threat ~d • conservation of natural resources and resource processes, therefore, happens to be the most critical prerequisite for the sustainability of the city, if not its survival. It is true that threats to all these three areas have been · separately deliberated on. Irrigation and drainage engineers of the state government are well exposed t_o the probletn of conservancy of the Kulti Gong and they know how disastrous it will be for Calcutta in case the river fails to carry the city wastewater down to the sea. Similarly, threats to the wetlands have been well deliberated at various levels and conservation initiatives have begun. Groundwater specialists have clearly identified the crisis of lowering of piezometric levels under the city and presence of arsenic in some of the city wells, well above per111issible limits. What however· has not been done is to establish the connectivity amongst these three threats and to identify the forest behind the trees. Taken together, these threats will disrupt the very water regime that sustains the city and the collapse of which will leave little option to get the city going. Ecological appraisal gives an altogether different dimension to the perception of the threat and planning for the steps to tackle the same. To initiate steps towards conserving the water regime major constraints have been shortlisted and brought together in the following table . 94

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Table 2

Areas and nature of concerns Constraints

Transactions Water Abstraction

Waste water Discharge

'

Surface water from the river Hoogli

1. Upland abstractions 2. Pollution (industrial and domestic) 3. International commitments

Groundwater

1. Lowering of piezometric levels 2. Protection of recharge areas 3. Arsenic pollution

Treatment and reu.se in wetlands

1. Wetland conversion 2. Wastewater fisheries becoming increasingly non-viable 3. Release of industrial effluent into drainage outlet canals

Underwater disposal through Kulti Gong

1. Decrease in upland flow 2. Shrinking spill basins 3. River bed siltations •

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One of the most dramatic examples of collapse of water regime is the case of Arai Sea, which was the world's fourth largest freshwater lake. On account of increasing abstraction of river water feeding the lake for irrigation,· the entire Arai Sea has almost become a wasteland. By . the year 2000 AD the water level is likely to drop by 23 meters and salinity level rise by six times compared to 30 years ago. Arai Sea provides a textbook lesson of how not to conserve natural water regimes. In the present case the situation is still manageable and can be restored to a large extent if a proper conservation plan is worked out and effectively implemented. Basic requirements of such a conservation plan are shown in the following table: "

SUBSYSTEM

DESIRABLE ACTION

River Hugli

I. National Subject

East Calcutta Wetlands I. Management Action Plan and its implementation 2. Dedicated authority 3. Provision of protected area status Groundwater

1. Complete regulation on groundwater abstraction 2. Preservation of recharge areas. 3. Initial water pricing

Kulti Gong

I . Continuous monitoring 2. Restriction on random conservation of spill-basin to dyked agriculture 3. Silt removal plan implementation

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Research Need The concept of conserving the urban water regime introduced in this paper is a classical example of using ecology as a · subjective tool to understand the environmental problems better and indicate thereafter the way forward. The significance of ecological stewardship is being appreciated .only recently and its application in identifying and mitigating the· problem of water regime conservation for Calcutta will be amongst the earliest of such efforts anywhere in this part of the world. It is precisely to address such a relatively untreated area of knowledge that the necessity of a well-conceived research initiative will be all the more legitimate. Accordingly, a preliminary indication of tile more important areas of in need of research may include the following : •

I.

Understanding various conflict situations amongst numerous user groups/stakeholders at the grassroot levels.

2.

Upstream/downstream linkages in relation to various landscape setting.

3;

Nature and trend of silting along outfall canals and the Kulti Gong and methods of silt transportation thereon.

4.

Major land use changes and related processes.

5.

Assessment of vulnerability of water regime in response to the aggregated effects of social, economic, physical, biological and bio-chemical changes within the specific catchment areas.

6.

Identifying point sources of pollution discharges adversely ' affecting the water regime.

7.

Interaction between physics of flow. in sub-surface media, aquatic chemistry and microbiology particularly in relation to the release of arsenic in the groundwater. •

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Conclusion .

The urban environmental agenda is no longer understood as something only to do with greening the city or· reducing the pollution levels. A desirable environment, at the first place, needs to ensure equitable (both inter-generational and intragenerational) access to essential. conditions of living at an affordable price. Calcutta has about two decades of experience in addressing the problems of urban environment. A closer look will bring out three basic . steps in preparing local environmental agenda, also defined as local agenda .21. These three steps may be generaliseC, for the poorer and developing parts of the world where existing amenities fa_ll far short in ensuring access to essential conditions of living . •

These three steps are:

•

·1~

Preparing an ordered assimilation of all existing info, 111ation relating to the city's environment

2.

Conventional sectoral initiatives to •be geared up to a "minimum action plan" drawn on the basis of available info111,ation for improving acce~s to essential conditions of living. •

3. J

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Understanding the transaction between urban activities and Nature, and locating the areas of disruption ot ~cological security of the city and initiating conservation programme to restore the balance.

A comprehensive status report for Calcutta which compiles all the major infor111ation aJid database has been published and is considered to "serve as the foundation for urban environmental improvement and restoration of Calcutta's environment and also for safeguarding the city from ecological imbalance". 98

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Secondly, on the basis of the above document a minimum action plan is drawn up. The ten-point programme will g a long way to substantially change the environment of the city for a better and sustainable living. All these can be implemented through conventional sectoral ini~iatives and the only requirement is to meet the challenge head-on! There is no need to rediscover these action points through a redundant ·, and expensive process of preparing an environmental master plan. •

Finally, looking at the relatively recent issue of ecological security of the city in this context, a concept of urban water regime has been introduced and it has been shown that the most striking disruption caused by the city has been of its friendly water regime that sustains it. All the three components of the water regime are under threat and any "business-asusual" approach will have te1111inal effect on the future of the city. The situation, nevertheless, is manageable and needs a comprehensive water regime conservation programme to be . taken up as early as possible. · • I

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KEY WORDS, KEY CONCEPTS Algal bloom: Abundance of green algae, fo11raed usually in ponds due to excess of nutrients, namely nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium.

Biodiversity: The range of biological diversity in a an area, which is sought to include all living creatures, from large and small trees to large and small animals and microscopic organisms, many of whose roles are yet to be understood by scientists.

Biomass:lre total weight of living matter available in an unit area of a given ecosystem.

BOD: Biological oxygen demand, which is a measµre us the biologically active matter present in the water. High BOD (that is, low oxygen) cannot support aquatic life

Brown agenda: This relates to industrial and urban pollution, as distinguished from Green Agenda on biodiversity on forestrelated concerns that dominate environmental activism.

Earth Summit: Held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, this is the last major global summit of heads of governments aimed at addressing all the environmental crises points facing the earth. It was meant to work out universally acceptable conventions and nor 111s, but very little worked out due to the reluctance of the Northern, or developed countries to change their lifestyles.

Ecosystem: Any given . ecological set up with a distinct identity, depending upon its geographical and climatic • conditions. There are some broad categories which help • understand the basic aspects of any given area, with an expected diversity of life for111s, interaction between living •

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and non-living matters, the richest being the tropical rainforests all over the world

Ganga Action Plan:

In 1985, late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi launched a go.v ernment campaign and action programme for de-polluting the Ganga, and action was initiated under phases. The first phase, which was supposed to have primarily dealt with removal of bacterial load, has been officially declared completed, though its evaluation remains an open question. The only positive aspect has been the incorporation the pond system as a· resource recovery .method through tradition sewage treatment as a model to be ·replicated wherever possible

Green Agenda: A pro-Nature, pro-people agenda oriented towards sustainable development and living styles, seeking to subvert the established industrial agenda

Kalahandi: An extremely impoverished .area .in the Koraput .

district of the state of Orissa. Kalahandi suffered almost pe1111anent drought conditions, partly due to being in· a rainsh~dow area, but partly also due to disastrous developmental schemes. Recent· reports, however, suggest it is making a tum around.

Laterite: Rock fo111,ed from red friable iron containing surface clay. .

Meridional: A central theme, a keystone position or a riveting issue around which concrete definitions in clearly defined areas might take place

Panchayat: · The lowest administrative and political unit in the Indian countryside. In some states, the grassroots level democratic. institution of the Panchayati Raj has taken roots and is refe11 ed to as 'local self-government', albeit controlled and ·maneouvered effectively by the political elite. 101

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Ramsar Convention: This is the particular environmental convention dealing with wetlands, and was adopted in Ramsar, Iran in 1971. However, within itself, it has und~rgone major political changes and in 1987, 'it radicalised its outlook on wetlands from merely that of habitat for waterfowl to a more holistic approach which incorpo_rated not just the people but also their potential role in providing food security to margini lsed peoples. -- . . _.

..

Realtors: Real estate lobbies aiming to take advantage of burgeoning populations, especially in poorer countries, and . seeking to . prQfiteer at any cost, with present and , future· environmental issues of an area being the least of the their concerns. Sectoral: Environmental activity aimed at rectification of a damaged situation usually takes place in narrow confines of a g~ven problem. This is the sectoral approach; while ecological approach is look at the whole from the part.

Somalia: A north east African country with a coastline rich w_ith coral reefs on~the Indian Ocean, with a largely agricultural economy dependent upon nomadic stock-raising, and meagre irrigated plantation-far ~•ting in the southern parts. It has been the theatre of constant tribal internecine hostility which has aggravated poverty, environmental and. health crises of unthinkable levels. Stabilisation pond: A shallow constructed pond, one to two metres deep, in which sewage is fed and detained for several (7-10) days, depending upon the climatic conditions. The basic process of purification takes place because algae-bacteria symbiosis, where algae receives energy through photosynthesis. The surface area of the pond is calculated on the basis of BOD load received by the pond. 102

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. The Sunderbans: The coastal forest and brackishwaterdominated ecosystem with huge marginalised populations depende~t on forest and riverine activities for survival, in the exrtreme south of the Ganga estuary. The area has goiwn and shrunken under varying conditions of geoligical and human pressures over the last few millennia, but is recognised as one . of the last frontiers of environmental battle in this part of the world. Once home to an amazing variety of plant and . animal life, it is fast becoming barren. The fabled mangroves of this , area are also the last protection of southern West· Bengal against powerful destructive tropical cyclones that repeatedly visit the West Bengal-Bangladesh coast. .

Third World countries: This delineation of countries into .• 'worlds' ori inally came up during the Chinese Communist Revolution. ird World generally refers to the developing and underdeveloped countries which were being subjected to various phases of imperialism. Today, there are various political .· '• configurations of such countries, like the SAARC, etc, but wide varieties of economic development witnessed by these countries has left \large gaps in their making a common cause politically or even in the environmental arena. ln today's nomenclature, they fall under the group generally referred to as Southern countries, each with its distinct. set of environmental crisis and, therefore, varying stands in the global bargaining occasions, l~e the Rio Earth Summit. \

Trophic levels: Steps ·_o f the ecological pyramids, e.g. producers, primary and secondary consumers, etc . -

.

Watershed: This is an imaginary line, often following the crest of ridges and spurs, which divides all the water and .streams flowing into one river from those flowing into the next. 103

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Wetlands: There has been considerable debate over a single acceptable definition of wetlands, but more or less, these can be described as marshy, shallow water-logged areas with water quality varying from eutrophic to mesqptrophic to oligotrophic, brackish, sweet or saline, which support aquatic plants that are flood resistant and normally do not survive under per111anent terrestrial conditions. Wetlands are the homes of a wide range of life fo1111s, many of them economically and ecologically enriching, though the full potential is still not known. They are the homes of some of the most sturdy and technologically innovative local populace and are arguably areas of importance f~r providing food security to economically and ecologically handicapped communities .

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