Questions about water crisis. Questions about mining. Questions about agriculture. Questions about 8% economic growth. Questions about alternate energy. Questions about tigers. Questions about Naxalism. How everything is interconnected. The Future?
Rudyard Kipling wrote: I keep six honest serving-men (They taught me all I knew); Their names are What and Why and When And How and Where and Who.
We hope this little project inspires everyone to ask questions and explore the world around us in newer and braver ways.
The Great Indian Clearance Sale is an idealogy-free art project, an adventure in information.
Designed, illustrated and written by: Hemant Anant Jain Research, writing and design inputs: Anvita Lakhera Print production: R. Vishwanathan Image acknowledgements: www.neubauwelt.com
We asked questions about, perhaps, the most pressing issues of our times. We got the answers, mostly from brave publications like Down to Earth, Tehelka, indiatogether.org, infochangeindia.org and many informative blogs written by many amazing people around the world.
Why ‘The Great Indian Clearance Sale’? Because if you want to dump hazardous waste, if you want to test GM Crops, if you want to take the land away from people and use it for mining, if you could not care less about environmental norms, it seems India is the perfect ‘market’ for you.
We then explored visual ways to understand, and present all the information. The process was, and is, live through blogging, Twitter and Facebook. So far we have got more than 30,000 people to refer back to the sources we use, and every week, we get over 1500 people to see and discuss links and issues on our Facebook page. The increasing numbers tell us this adventure is far from over.
www.greatindiansale.org www.facebook.com/greatindiansale
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You.
India has committed to reduce emissions intensity of its GDP to 20-25% below the 2005 level by 2020.
To reduce emissions in the already efficient Fertilizer sector we would need to convert to natural gas. Availability may, however, be a problem.
India also wants to maintain an economic growth rate of 8%.
Coal fired power generation in India is more efficient than the global average (30% vs 28.4%). But climatic conditions may impede further efficiency.
Most of the emissions come from 6 sectors of the Indian industry: Paper & Pulp, Cement, Aluminium, Steel and Fertilizer.
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In most cases the low carbon scenario will stagnate after 2030. There’s a limit to how much emissions we can bring down.
Cement: Our cement industry is the most energy efficient in the world. Emissions can be further reduced by 35%. Emissions can be reduced by 17% in Steel and 40% in Aluminium. But for Al, 30% of the total energy has to come from renewables. Potential to save energy in Paper: 75%
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Fo An 8% economic growth means a robust growth in all these six sectors. It means we will require more bauxite, more iron ore, more limestone, more freshwater and more land to fuel this growth. It also means Greenhouse Gas Emissions will triple. From 897 million MT in 2008-09 to 2668 million MT in 2030-31. The per capita emissions will increase from 0.8MT to 1.8 MT. Annually we can contain carbon emissions by 18% if we massively deploy renewable energy in the power sector.
Where are the minerals? Where is the land?
Where is the water?
Renewable energy plants require a lot of land.
These six sectors are already consuming water equivalent to the water need of the country. In 2008-09, they withdrew 41, 538 Million Cubic Mts of fresh water. Water enough to sustain the needs of 1.1 billion people. They consumed 5641 MCM of it and discharged 35, 897 MCM of it, polluting more freshwater.
And most of the minerals we need also lie buried in high population density areas (329ppl / sq. km). How many people will have to be displaced for this massive requirement of land? How many more Dantewadas, Singurs, Niyamgiris and Kalinganagars? And then, there is water.
Water based conflicts, both national and international, are becoming more frequent. Our groundwater reserves are drying up. Rivers are unhealthy. Where and how will we get the water for 8% economic growth? A low-carbon stagnation. Lack of resources to fuel the economic growth. Is it time then to redefine development, before we run out of time, land and people’s resilience?
Based on and excerpted from Center for Science and Environment’s report: Challenge of the New Balance.
Was Gandhi right about India? Development as it exists is perhaps like expired medicine. It makes good placebo, but it can’t cure the cancer that is spreading fast through our society. We have seen what happens with development that is based on consumerism. The economic crash in 2009 was proof that Keynes with his ‘fair is foul and foul is fair’ may be irrelevant today. With climate spiralling out of control and a planet gasping for breath, it’s time we go back to what Gandhi said - the Earth can provide for everyone’s needs, not everyone’s greed.
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2008
My vision of a poverty-free India will be an India where a vast majority, something like 85 percent, will eventually live in cities. Not megalopolises but cities. In an urban environment it is easier and more efficient to provide water, electricity, education, roads, security and entertainment rather than in 6,00,000 villages. P Chidambaram in an interview to Tehelka Magazine, Vol 5, Issue 21, Dated May 31, 2008
“Resist the further concentration of the growing population in large cities by reversing the trend of migration from rural to urban areas.”
Referring to the Western world, Schumacher said that ‘it is now widely accepted that there are limits to growth on the established pattern, so that, in all probability, the trends established over the last twenty-five years could not be continued even if everybody wished to do so. The requisite physical resources were simply not there, and living nature all around us, the Ecosystem, could not stand the strain.
E.F. Schumacher summing up Gandhi’s prescription for the salvation of India and indeed for the whole world. 1. Start all economic reasoning from the genuine needs of the people and help the poor to help themselves out of poverty. 2. Revitalise and foster not only agriculture as such but also all possible productive, non-agricultural activities in the rural areas such as cottage industries for potters, weavers, shoemakers, carpenters, blacksmiths etc. 3. Develop systematic policies, based on the best available knowledge for the mobilisation of all productive resources, the greatest of which is the population itself.
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More than 100,000 poor families have already been evicted due to projects connected with the Commonwealth Games in Delhi, and up to 40,000 families are likely to be displaced before the Games begin in October Housing and Land Rights Network report, 2010.
2010
36 years ago, Schumacher prophesied that if the next twenty-five years in India produced a continuation of the trends of development based on the Western model established since independence, the outlook for the mass of poor people was grim, even hopeless.
“Leaving people to die in open sky on a cold night is the grossest violation of human rights. The right to shelter is as important as the right to livelihood.” - Chief Justice AP Shah said, releasing the report.
The value of nothing The fact that we are causing climate change, and that it is already killing 300,000 people a year, is an example of how our markets’ inability to price the environment and price society correctly is actually causing loss of human life. But it’s not just in terms of climate change that markets are failing. They’re failing everywhere, including the way we distribute the most vital of goods (for example, food) and today there are over a billion people going hungry around the world. And so what I’m arguing in The Value of Nothing is that we’ve been trained to become consumers rather than to understand our connections with the world, and other ways in which we can value the world that don’t rely on a very faulty market system. Raj Patel in an interview to Treehugger.
Based on EF Schumacher’s Small is Beautiful, Surur Hoda’s articles in gandhifoundation.org and Raj Patel’s ‘Value of Nothing’.
The Anatomy of their greed. This poor planet has no future because a comprehensive climate agreement will never be signed. India says it will not agree on cutting carbon emissions, as it will hinder their growth. Of course, which allows us to repeat the same mistakes as the west and follow the path of greed in the name of development. Will that ‘eradicate’ poverty? It would have, if carbon was the only reason which was deciding how rich or how poor our country will be. The real reason why India will always be poor is corruption. You need proof? You got it.
The real emissions that need to be controlled.
When ordinary people pay bribes worth $5 billion a year for public services, capping carbon is not the issue, capping corruption is.
A peek into the darkness Farmer aid: 82000 crores Earmarked for farmers. Eaten by corrupt officials. And while the farmer suicides continue, GM Crops continue to be introduced unabated. More farmers are landing up in trouble. More aid is coming in. And more money is being swallowed by hungry officials.
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Mayawati statues: 1000 crores Where did that money come from? Surely it was our hard earned money in taxes.
Rice scam: 2500 crores Guidelines were flouted and rules bypassed by state-owned trading companies to allow select private rice-exporting companies to export 10 lakh MT of rice despite a ban. They monopolised the market created for them by friends in the government and walked away with business worth Rs 2,500 crore while robbing the PDS of valuable rice in a country where 48 per cent of children below three years are malnourished. -Outlook, 27 July, 2009
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Coal Import Contract: 6000 crores Ordinary bribes every year: 2500 crores The list is endless. If you spend just under a minute scanning the recent newspapers and magazines, these figures would come up. Spend a little more and you will come up with some astounding figures. Isn’t this the real reason for poverty? But of course, we need to blame it on something else. In comes carbon. While the debate rages on, let’s get our briefcases full. There is work to be done = bribes to be be paid.
We want 85% of our people to live in cities. That’s the vision of our dear home minister.
Based on Arundhati Roy’s various essays, Shoma Chaudhary’s articles in Tehelka.
The Anatomy of our greed. Ms Roy continues: Underlying this nightmare masquerading as ‘vision’ is the plan to free up vast tracts of land and all of India’s natural resources, leaving them ripe for corporate plunder. Already forests, mountains and water systems are being ravaged by marauding multinationals, backed by a State that has lost its moorings and is committing what can only be called ‘ecocide’.
And so we ignore the rich biodiversity of Niyamgiri and allow mining there.
“Realising this ‘vision’ would require social engineering on an unimaginable scale. It would mean inducing, or forcing, about five hundred million people to migrate from the countryside into cities. That process is well under way and is quickly turning India into a police state in which people who refuse to surrender their land are being made to do so at gunpoint.” Arundhati Roy
And we force the tribals out of their land to tackle Maoism. Which a minister alleges is being funded by mining companies.
And we take away the land from the farmers and give it to car companies.
And we let GM Crops in. More than 200,000 farmers commit suicide as they get caught in the debt trap.
Food, water, land, agriculure. The wheels of development gone wrong, grind on. And we are too blinded by consumerism to question it.
As a reward for our ignorance, we get the swanky malls. Now, 10 every square kilometre. With water and electricity running 24x7 while the country scorches and thirsts for the same.
But what happens if the ‘consumer’ starts questioning. What happens if we start saying, ‘hold on, we’d like our development to be sustainable.’ If we say that yes taking bauxite from the land is important, but perhaps preserving the biodiversity of the nation is even more important. What if we worry about fresh, clean air and not just a better air conditioner? What if we say we want better public transport, for, that solves what a bigger car doesn’t? What if we make the wheels of greed come to a halt? And begin.
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LAND
“It’s as if the Land Acquisition Act (LAA), 1894, of the British wasn’t bad enough. The Government has come up with an amendment to this Act which it wants to push through as a new law, making it even more anti-people. The Government has used the LAA all over the place to displace people at will, sometimes using repressive measures, and with no or meagre compensation.” Here are some facts about the law: • The new Bill says companies must acquire 70 percent of the land at market rates, and the state can acquire 30 percent for them, leaving room for the government to use coercion if farmers are unwilling to sell. • There is no guarantee of alternative employment as part of Resettlement and Rehabilitation. Land-for-land compensation will be made available to an extent possible, but it’s not mandatory. • Overrides the Forest Rights Act, 2006, which allowed adivasis and local tribes a claim to the land they were living on and was hailed for “undoing an historical injustice”. It’s back to square one. The principle of Eminent Domain, the basis of the LAA, was introduced by the British. It said that the Queen owns all land in the country. The old Bill replaced “The Queen of Britian” with “The State of India”. The new Bill makes no change to this. Based and excerpted from the article in Tehelka, Vol 6, Issue 32, 15th Aug, 2009, by Sandeep Pandey, Magsaysay Award Winner.
• About 30 years ago, in Piparwar, Hazaribagh, around 20,000 people were displaced during the acquisition of 16,000 acres by Central Coalfields Ltd. The villagers were resettled in another area with 0.05 acres per household — although villagers allege about 30 percent of the displaced did not get even this — and jobs were provided to 950 of them. The CCL considered its duty done with this, while the people whose livelihood had centred on agro-forestry now became part of the “developed economy” as daily wagers living in slums. • Last year, an all-India fact-finding team comprising six democratic rights organisations cited the instance of those displaced by the Chandil dam. They visited Gangudih colony, a rehabilitation centre of the Chandil dam, one of 12 such centres for the 116 submerged villages. The project started in the 1970s. The resistance was brutally suppressed by police firing in 1978. Though the dam was completed in 1984, the canals are yet to be fully dug. The first rehabilitation promise was made in 1990 when the displaced families were offered Rs 20,000 for construction of house and Rs 50,000 for purchase of alternative land. In 2003, this was modified to Rs 50,000 for construction of a house and Rs 75,000 for purchase of alternative land. Till 2008, less than half the displaced families had received the rehabilitation package. • According to the Annual Report 2004- 2005 of the Union Ministry of Rural Development, Jharkhand topped the list of Adivasi land alienation in India with 86,291 cases involving a whopping 10,48,93 acres. • According to the Planning Commission, less than 50 per cent of the entire displaced population has been rehabilitated. Walter Fernandes, former Director of the Indian Social Institute, Delhi, says less than 20 per cent of them have been rehabilitated. Tribals, just 8 percent of population, comprise 40 percent of the six crore displaced persons in the country
By Rajesh Sinha. From Tehelka Magazine, Vol 7, Issue 25, Dated June 26, 2010
The Red Dot “On a map of India, mark the districts in terms of forest wealth - where the rich and dense tree cover is found. Then overlay the water wealth - the sources of streams and rivers. On this, plot the mineral wealth - iron ore, coal, bauxite and all things shiny that make economies rich. Then, mark on this wealth of India, another indicator districts where the poorest people of our country live. These are also the tribal districts of the country. You will find a complete match. The richest lands are where the poorest live. Now complete this cartography of the country with the colour red. These are the same districts where Naxalites roam, where the government admits it is fighting a battle with its own people, who use the gun to terrorize and kill. Clearly, here is a lesson we need to learn about bad development.� - Sunita Narain, June 04, 2010 in The Times of India.
What they say: Mining generates local employement. What we get: In 1994-95, to produce Rs. 1 crore of minerals, Indian mines employed about 25 people. In 2003-04, producing the same value required only 8. In 9 years the employment potential of Indian mines decreased by 70%. And between 1991 and 2004-05, employment in the formal mining industry in India fell by 30%.
What they say: Mining benefits states. What we get: A skewed royalty regime means the benefits of mining don’t percolate to the states. In Chattisgarh and Jharkhand, the mineral royalties contribute only 10-13% of total revenue receipts. In Orissa it is about 5-6%. In Andhra: 3% and in Goa: 1%
What they say: We will rehabilitate people.What we get: Mining has the worst record in rehabilitation and resettlement. Less than 25% of people displaced due to various development projects have been resettled. There is no data on rehabilitation of people affected by mining.
And then there’s Naxalism. For every Naxalite there are roughly seven armed personnel. In the Naxalite affected areas, average landholding is less than half a hectare and there is hardly 1 drinking source for every 10,000 people.
Based on and excerpted from ‘Mine no more’ and ‘Rich Land, Poor People’ - Center for Science and Environment’s publications on mining.
On May 17, 2007 a leopard was photographed in the Niyamgiri Hills in Orissa. It was a visibly annoying variable padding across the terrain of economics. One not accounted for, immaterial as a ‘cost’, a pure ‘negative externality’. The leopard was a fiscal nightmare in Orissa’s and India’s development dream. For it - the leopard, not development - required trees, preferably mature forest. The leopard was not reflected in priceterms in mining bauxite in the Niyamgiri Hills, nor was the forest. A few months later, the forest department countermanded a leopard skin. Villagers in the mountain also got acquisition notices. Fauna and Flora remained external to GDP.
But for the magic glasses, the Niyamgiri forest includes, amongst some spectacular species of trees, about 50 species of important medicinal plants, 20 species of wild ornamental plants and more than 10 species of wild relatives of crop plants, such as sugarcane, at least 15 species of orchids. Animals found: Tiger, Elephant, Palm Civet, Mouse Deer, Barking Deer, Sambhar, Striped Hyena, Chital, Wild Dog, Sloth Bear, Bison, Nilgai, Giant Squirrels, Four-horned Antelope. Most of these animals are in the IUCN Red List, signifying they are endangered. But for the magic glasses, the Niyamgiri Hills would be celebrated for their richness in this International Year of Biodiversity, 2010.
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Based on and excerpted from ‘Mine no more’ and ‘Rich Land, Poor People’ - Center for Science and Environment’s publications on mining.
Mine or not to mine? There is a better question to ask: Should we destroy our rivers for mining? The answer will lead you to facts and perhaps asking more pointed questions, about the dumping of fly ash in rivers, to the friendly company who is mining bauxite and ‘happiness’.
The undermining of water. Most of India’s iron reserves are found along the watersheds and courses of rivers such as the Indravati in Chattisgarh, the Mahanadi and Baitarani in Orissa, the Tungabhadra in Karnataka and the Mandovi in Goa. Over 80% of the coal in Jharkhand and a substantial portion of the Raniganj coalfields in West Bengal are found along the banks of the river Damodar. Mica is distributed, in Rajasthan, between and around the rivers Sambhar, Luni and Chambal; in Orissa, around the Mahanadi. Limestone is found along the river Chambal. Chromite is found around the tributaries of the river Cauvery, and along the Tungabhadra, Baitarani and Brahmani rivers in Orissa.
Bauxite deposits exist near the rivers Chenab and Mahi, the tributaries of the Krishna and Cauvery, the rivers Tungabhadra and Mahanadi and near the river Sind in Madhya Pradesh.
Minerals are found in hard rocks, precisely where terrain streams originate from. What happens when ore is preferred to water? 1 Run-off from deforested slopes makes rivers heavy with silt and more prone to floods. 2. Mine tailings (what’s left after ores are processed) are often toxic; they greviously pollute rivers. 3. Mining for sand and gravel from riverbeds. 4. Breaching the groundwater table. 5. Heavy metal pollution: occurs when some metals - arsenic, cadmium, cobalt, copper, lead, silver, zinc - found in excavated rock - are exposed in an underground mine and come in contact with water. 8. Pollution from processing chemicals: when they leak or leach from the mine site into the nearby water-bodies. Based on and excerpted from ‘Mine no more’ and ‘Rich Land, Poor People’ - Center for Science and Environment’s publications on mining.
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Scarcity of drinking water, devastation of agriculture, stagnation of industries and major international water wars are some of the problems which are already surfacing above the trickle that is left of our water resources. Although many analysts believe that demand will outstrip supply of water by 2020, there is still hope for India. Water scarcity in India is predominantly a man-made problem; therefore if India makes significant changes in the way it thinks about water and manages its resources soon, if people take action immediately: start conserving water, begin to harvest rainwater, treat human, agricultural, and industrial waste effectively, and regulate how much water can be drawn out of the ground, India could ward off, or at least mollify, the impending crisis. From: Imminent Water Crisis in India: Nina Brooks, August 2007; www.arlingtoninstitute.org
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While the rivers are running dry, dying, getting polluted, there is a silent epidemic spreading through the country. Bottled water. Clean drinking water is scarce. The tap water is dirty. More and more people get their drinking water from the ugly 20 litre bottles. Where does this water come from? Why is water so readily available for these water companies? Shouldn’t a plastic water of bottle seem out of place in the logical scheme of things? Or, have these bottles of ‘packaged health’ quenched our thirst for asking questions?
The future wars, it is said, will be fought over water. A scary thought when we know more than 260 rivers cross national boundaries and their basins house 40% of the world’s population. Today, more than 20% of the world’s population lacks access to safe water and more than 50% are without basic sanitation. Collectively women around the world spend about, 40 billion hours a year walking to collect water. The global water crisis is the leading cause of death and disease around the world killing over 14000 people each day. Facts collected from UN studies and research on water.
While on the issue of water, during peak monsoon, Delhi gets about 40,000 MGD of water, most of which is not used as Delhi's treatment capacity is about 700 MGD and it doesn’t have any online storage capacity. “The river is the cleanest during monsoon due to the amount of water released into it by the DJB,” said sources. According to Central Pollution Control Board data, Delhi’s allocation for the monsoon, between July and October is 580 million cubic meters (MCM). Of this the Capital utilises 282 MCM and the remaining 298 MCM is allowed to flow away. - Times of India
The power of water harvesting.
People vs tigers, or, experts vs tigers? Because people and tigers have co-existed for centuries.
There has been considerable debate about allowing tribal communities expanded land and building rights in wildlife reserves, which threatens to crowd tigers off their few remaining sanctuaries. ‘If they recognize the tribal-rights bill,’ says an expert, “the wildlife-protection act and the forestconservation act will just collapse.” “While we are not allowed to take a single blade of grass from anywhere near the park, conservationists make crores out of it. In addition, they have bought land next to the park and have constructed houses, and run hotels and guest houses.” A villager in Ranthambore
Based on Down to Earth cover story, December, 2005 and The Tribal’s Right by Michelle Chawla in infochangeindia.org
Among those who own houses and hotels near the park are some of the well-known conservationists and their relatives. These properties are within 500 metres of the forest boundary. GREED
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People’s rights to their land and environment are not conflicting issues. Corporate greed and environment are. Shankar of Raytali village, Dahanu, retells the popular Warli folktale about the rat that takes away the grain from the fields. Called ‘The Rat's Right’, he explains that the rat was one of the earliest creatures to provide humans with the seeds to begin agriculture. Thus when they see the tops of their rice crop eaten up, the adivasis do not call the rat a thief, but say that it has taken its rightful share. The rat inevitably finds its role and space in the lives of the Warlis. Several other stories of wolves and ants, rabbits and tigers from around India reveal the rich cultural ecology and ethos of local communities. The tribals aren’t stupid people. Their knowledge and ways of co-existence with the environment is what we need to preserve our environment, and our country. From Michelle Chawla’s ‘The Tribal’s Right’ - infochangeindia.org
And while the debate continues, this is what is happening on a daily basis:
When the trap’s jagged metal teeth sink into its paw, the tiger howls - an alarm that can rouse a sleepy park ranger. So, a smart poacher will plunge a spear down the trapped animal’s throat and tear out its vocal chords; then, at his leisure, he can poison or electrocute the cat.
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INSTRUCTIONS: 1. Grow Bt Cotton. 2. Bollworms will die. You get a good crop. Profit. Climb up the ladder. 3. Bollworms develop resistance. Secondary pests attack. Crop fails. 4. Debt. 5. More debt. 6. Toss a coin. Heads you lose. Tails they win.
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GM corn and cotton are engineered to produce their own built-in pesticide in every cell. When bugs bite the plant, the poison splits open their stomach and kills them. The Bt-toxin produced in GM plants, however, is designed to be more toxic and cannot be washed off the plant. Flu like symptoms are now being reported by farm workers throughout India, from handling Bt cotton. Studies has also shown Bollworms developing resistance to Bt toxin and becoming infinitely more dangerous and uncontrollable. Add to this the fact that cotton is not only attacked by Bollworms, but about 160 other pests as well, and you have a situation where the only question to ask really is, ‘Why do we need GMOs?’
For the first time anywhere in the world, biotech agriculture giant Monsanto has admitted that insects have developed resistance to its Bt cotton crop. Field monitoring in parts of Gujarat has discovered that the Bt crop is no longer effective against the pink bollworm pest there. The company is advocating that Indian farmers switch to its second-generation product to delay resistance further. -The Hindu, March 06, 2010
Genetic pollution due to GMOs can alter the life in the soil forever and leave a trail of destruction that we will never be able to reverse.
It’s a raging battle. On one side are the biotech companies and on the other - the farmers and common people. Around the world the battle is being fought over the feasibility of Genetically Modified Food. Many are in favour of it. Those in favour say GM Foods are harmless. But, that is not proven. It would take years to find out the real effects of GM Food and then only they should be ‘unleashed’ on humans. If at all. But why are the companies that make GM Food are in a hurry to get them approved? Because with climate change they have an excuse of solving the food crisis. But that’s a tall claim and should be well tested. Or it would mean compromising on our health, our country’s food security, and destroying small farmers.
F The battle over
Agritech companies such as Monsanto, Pioneer and Syngenta don’t let their seeds be tested. For a decade their user agreements have explicitly forbidden the use of the seeds for any independent research. Under the threat of litigation, scientists cannot test a seed to explore the different conditions under which it thrives or fails. They cannot compare seeds from one company against those from another company. And perhaps most important, they cannot examine whether the genetically modified crops lead to unintended environmental side effects. Research on genetically modified seeds is still published, of course. But only studies that the seed companies have approved ever see the light of a peer-reviewed journal. Scientific American, August 2009
Are we being made lab rats?
Based on the in-depth research done on GMOs around the world, Vandana Shiva’s interviews and essays, National Geographic articles. All taken from the one site for everything you want to find out about GMOs: www.gmwatch.org
OD What the GM Food companies say, and arguments against their claims. What the companies say: There is no evidence that presently developed GM Foods are harmful to health and environment. Deceptive. The truth is that there is no scientific proof that the GM Foods on the market are harmless. There are studies, however, that are pointing out to the harmful effects. The Guardian reported that British scientist Dr Arpad Pusztai’s findings showed that rats fed on GM Potatoes (both raw and cooked) after 10 days suffered a weakened immune system as well as severe impairment in the development of the internal organs such as heart, liver, kidney and even the brain.
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Environment: The research to investigate long term environmental effects would take many years in each single case of genetic engineering. An expert appointed by the European Parliament to assess this issue concluded: “Our current knowledge does not provide us with the means to predict the ecological long-term effects of releasing organisms into the environment. So it is beyond the competence of the scientific system to answer such a question...”
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What the companies say: GM Foods will save the world from global famine through greatly improved crops. The report from International Assessment for Agricultural Science and Technology for Development, initiated by the World Bank and the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, and conducted by 400 scientists over a period of three years, acknowledges that GM crops will not play a substantial role in addressing the key problems of climate change, biodiversity loss, hunger and poverty. “The future of farming lies in a biodiversity and labour-intensive agriculture that works with nature and the people, not against them.” This report has been endorsed by our government.
What the companies say: This is nothing new. Mankind has been modifying genes since thousands of years in breeding. In mating, a chromosome from the mother, o-o-o-o (green ) is combined with a chromosome of the father, o-o-o-o (blue). The sequence of DNA “code words” in each chromosome remains unchanged. And the chromosomes remain stable. The mating mechanism has been developed over billions of years and yields stable and reliable results.
In genetic engineering, a set of foreign genes, o-o-o-o (red) is inserted haphazardly in the midst of the sequence of DNA “code words” (in this case in the DNA inherited from the mother [green]). The insertion disrupts the ordinary command code sequence in the DNA. This disruption may disturb the functioning of the cell, and make the chromosome unstable in unpredictable and potentially hazardous ways.
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Remember the Himalayas? Jog your memory. The Himalayas. Yes, the guardian angels of India. The rainmakers. Where rivers are born. You may also remember a certain image from the Ramayana where Hanuman carries a holy mountain to save Laxman. Yes, those Himalayas. Or, the mountains where you spent the most amazing holidays of your life. Remember the Har ki Dun trek? Yes, those Himalayas. We got news for you. We destroyed them.
Selling bioreserves for tourism? Done. The first major ski resort in the Himalayas could be open by 2012 and attract up to two million people a year. The 190 million pound Himalayan Ski Village (HSV) in the Dhauladhar region will cover 6000 acres of mountainside with five miles of lifts and four hotels with 500 five-star rooms. The project requires 1200 KLD (Kilo Litre/day) water (equivalent to water consumed by approx. 8000 people in a day) and 22MW power; which is nearly 10 times the average use. Acrylic would be used to create artificial snow which is known to pollute water sources.
Hanuman View Apartments.
Building concrete jungles everywhere on the mountains? Done.
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The mad scramble to loot water is on without care or concern for the environment. Dams have been constructed without environmental clearances; rivers are being diverted, rivulets redirected, debris from construction work is destroying forests, shrubs, creating water channels that were never there. All this is seriously eroding ecosystems.
A cement factory in a reserved forest in Himachal? Done.
Book now to get amazing rates! Letting environmental degradation destroy the flora and fauna? Done. Fruit production has gone downhill in Himachal Pradesh, by around 50 per cent in apples and pears, the top two fruit crops of the state.
Doing nothing about people who come and treat the mountains like a garbage bin? Done. Not banning plastic in most of the areas? Done.
Making dams in the most ecologically fragile places to ensure total destruction of flora, fauna and common sense? Done. Planning hundreds of more? Done. Current data reveals that 104 large hydroelectric projects of a cumulative capacity of 55, 556 MW have been proposed in Arunachal Pradesh. Several unique features of Arunachal fragile rock structure; location in a highly seismic zone; diversity of ethnic communities, a large percentage of which is dependent on traditional natural resource-based livelihoods; unique sociocultural and agro-ecological practices; and the area’s rich biodiversity, have been conveniently overlooked. Environmental clearance reports for these are a joke. One of the reports listed wildlife including red panda, snow leopard, Himalayan black bear, musk deer - all critically endangered species. The report went on to conclude: No major wildlife observed.
An almost complete wipeout of wildlife due to poaching? Another few years. There is too little of it left to demand such things as ‘wildlife reserves’. Bring on the hotels and property in the reserved forest areas.
As for saving Laxman, it would be impossible today, wouldn’t it? Unless of course Hanuman can find the magic herb at the Sanjeevni mall, made in the heart of the Himalayas. Now, that’s an idea. Any takers?
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MORALS
Based on ‘Are we destroying the Himalayas’ by Arun Shrivastava in www.peoplesvoice.org; Environment Clearance Report, Tehelka, Vol 6, issue 4, Jan 31, 2009; Tehelka, Vol 5, Issue 14, April 12, 2008
Why do some of our ministers say banning polythene bags is not an eco-friendly solution? Do you drive a car? Plastic is a by product of petroleum, and we are a fossil fuel society. So if you think the all powerful petroleum/plastic lobby will ever let us ban polythene bags, in a country where corruption is a fine art, you must really be kidding yourself. So forget about bans on polythene bags. The only way out of the mess they create is if people stop using it. And that will never be the case. Which means, the great Indian sale wins! And the market = country = market, is ripe for biodegradable polythene bags. Biodegradable? That’s something to worry about later. First, have you heard of a word called Nurdles?
GREED
Birds are stupid. Cows are stupid. Humans are stupid. The world according to the plastic lobby.
MORALS
Nurdle soup for the consumerist soul. Lining our beaches and filling our oceans are polythene bags, syringes, plastic food containers, pebbled remains of polystyrene packaging and things called Nurdles. Nurdles are raw materials of plastic production. Minute plastic cylinders about 20 mm high. Some are about 20 microns - slightly thinner than human hair. So while animals have been choking on plastic and carcasses have been found around the world, of birds and mammals, containing inordinate amounts of plastic trash, it is the Nurdles that are really the superstars. It’s simple really. The smaller the particles, the easier it gets for even zooplankton to eat them. And as common sense would tell us, the faster these amazing plastics will reach the human bodies. Haven’t they already?
Body scrubs, hand massage creams, super whitening toothpastes. One word: Nurdle! Check the ingredients of your cosmetics. A lot of them including toothpastes use ‘miro-fine polyethylene beads’, or polythene beads, or polythene micro spheres, or simply polythene. All this just goes down the drain, into the rivers, into the oceans, into the organisms, fish, birds, animals. We do eat some of those things, don’t we? And you wondered why the fish tasted so much better these days. Thanks to the amazing plastic industry. From ‘The World Without Us’ by Alan Wiesman.
Google ‘the great pacific garbage dump’ , or ‘north pacific gyre’ and see what you get.
According to the plastic association, replacing polythene bags with paper was not an eco-friendly solution as more trees would have to be cut to produce all that paper. According to Greenpeace, more than 1 million birds and 100,000 marine mammals are estimated to perish each year by either eating or becoming trapped in plastic waste. Eating plastic bags results in death of 100 cattle per day in U.P. in India. In the stomach of a dead cow, as much as 35 kg of plastic was found. Polythene bags choking up the drains was one of the biggest cause of the Mumbai floods of 1998.
They maintain that it is the failure of the solid waste management by local bodies that is forcing the state governments to ban the use of plastic bags. Plastic Association said: ‘Plastic is a chemically inert substance, used worldwide for packing and is not per-se hazardous to health and enviornment. Recycling of plastic, if carried out as per approved guidelines, may not be an enviornmental or health hazard’.
Biodegradable plastics! As far as ‘biodegradable’ polythene bags are concerned. It is extremely tough to achieve that even in highly controlled laboratory conditions. Garbage dumps, rivers, drains are really far from ideal, wouldn’t you say? But there in lies an amazing business opportunity for spurious biodegradable plastics. Easier on the conscience but losing none of their traditional qualities. The Great Indian Clearance Sale is on. Look out for tenders for biodegradable polythene bags.
Horn not ok please. The World: In many US and European cities policies are creating walkable neighbourhoods and fully pedestrian spaces. Some global examples are Kaufingerstrafe in Munich and Nanjing Road in Shanghai. Copenhagen has done extensive pedestrianisation. Zurich and Oxford streets are good examples. Buenos Aires, Curitiba, Sao Paulo, Shanghai have begun to create car free shopping streets. Studies show pedestriansation of shopping areas has positive effects on sales. Legal reforms have also been initiated to pedetrianise as well as to reduce traffic volumes. In London, Road Traffic Reduction Act allows authorities to reduce traffic levels or their rate of growth in targeted area to reduce congestion and improve air quality. San Francisco has enforced Better Street Policy. New York city is promoting pedestrian infrastructure. In Auckland Land Transport (Road Users) Rule stops motorists from stopping, or parking on a footpath and pedestrians have to be given right of the way.
India Our country does have a plethora of laws and bye laws related to road safety, road infrastructure, pedestrian protection, and urban planning that have bearing on pedestrians. But laws are fragmented and do not add up to effectively promote pedestrianisation or protect pedestrians and their rights with any degree of stringency. Currently, laws cannot even prevent loss of walking space to widen the roads. Communities are not involved in decision making on road infrastructure. From Center for Science and
Environment report on ‘How walkable are our cities?’
The challenge of going
India wants to drastically ramp up its solar power production to 22,000 MW by 2022. What are the challenges?
Rural India The NSM (National Solar Mission) aims for only 20 million solar lighting systems for rural areas, which is about one-fourth of the 72 million households that use kerosene today. Given the poor rural electricity distribution systems and the absence of clear plans to remedy this situation in the near future, the poor who are off-grid will be left behind without lighting for an unknown length of time. Indeed, even when they are connected to the grid, the quality is so poor that off-grid lighting remains essential. Prayas recommends a substantial change in priorities by the NSM and “a rapid roll out of PV based solar lighting systems for the poor from a social, economic as well as ethical perspective”. In fact, PV lanterns are an excellent stop gap measure and the government should adopt special mechanisms to promote innovative distribution of these lanterns. With white light emitting diode solar lanterns with warranty and service, we could light up the countryside by selling each for a small sum (Rs.400 each if bought in bulk). Even if the government provided full subsidy, this would amount to Rs.3000 crores, which is only about 8 per cent of the NSM subsidy.
Greed The government should verify the antecedents of the companies it selects. Else it could become a tax-break haven like the wind energy industry that attracted high net-worth individuals like Bollywood personalities. “They were not interested in wind energy but the 80 per cent tax break the new technology promised,” says Deepak Puri of Moser Baer. “We know today that many of the contractors, who took on the assignment to build and operate the plants, used poor quality equipment and disappeared. Solar must not fall into this trap.” Land Land is the most contentious of all projected costs of conversion to solar energy. The requirement of land is roughly five acre (2.2 ha) per MW of power generated.
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Laws Indian trade laws discourage production of solar cells domestically. A 12.8 per cent duty is imposed on importing raw material for making cells, whereas there is no duty on importing readymade modules. Inverters that convert direct current from the solar panel to transmission-able alternate current attracts a duty of 21.5 per cent. Currently India does not produce any inverters but imports them. Without quality controls, India could become a dump for rejected solar technology from the other countries. Excerpted from Solar Mission: More light needed by Sujatha Byravan: indiatogether.org And Down to Earth June 15, 2010 cover story: Every Day is SunDay
Here’s a little idea. And why it will never work in our country. Let’s say we started a text message campaign to light up the poorest regions of India. Each text message will cost 10 rupees. If 10 lakh of us did it, it would generate 1 crore rupees. So how many wind turbines would that money install?
It’s a simple enough question. We just want to find out how many wind turbines we can install in a crore. Right? Welcome to the heart of darkness. Or, the real story of wind energy in India. The capacity of wind energy generation in India has steadily increased while it’s actual generation has decreased. Wind plants have been functioning at 18-19% efficiency. The government on the other hand offers great subsidies and tax benefits for people who invest in wind energy.
According to a report in Down to Earth: As it emerges, companies have merrily installed plants, not to generate power, but to gain from tax and depreciation benefits. The business seems a closed loop - the turbine-maker makes deals with investor companies to set up plants and while some companies sell their 1.5 mw WTG for over Rs 9 crore, nobody quite knows the cost of a windmill. The turbine-maker gains; the investor profits from tax benefits and depreciation.
Let’s say our idea indeed took shape. What would happen next? A local politician will stand up and proclaim that the windmill is blowing away the monsoon clouds. Instead of checking his IQ, the government will set up an expensive committee to investigate the issue. If you do not believe that this is possible, here is a report from The Times of India (1st May, 2004): Why does money not grow on money plants? The state government may well appoint an expert committee to investigate into this matter. Because, on Wednesday, it announced that the decision to appoint a committee to investigate if the windmills erected for power generation in Satara district were driving away rain-bearing clouds from western Maharashtra.
I-T authorities believe windmill owners make false depreciation claims to evade taxes; to the tune of Rs 700-1,000 crore.
No wonder, then, that wind energy is not the business of energy companies, but rich people wanting tax cuts. Is this why hotel companies, spinning mills, temple trusts, even film stars, are into wind energy? The Great Indian Clearance Sale is on. And we are taking the wind out of our country. GREED
MORALS
‘Market’ Research. In a survey conducted by The Great Indian Clearance Sale, more people knew about the variety of burgers in a popular fast food chain than about the number of species of birds in their neighbourhood. Knowledge about burgers.
Knowledge about birds if you count the number of crows as the number of bird species spotted.
More people knew about the sales in their malls than the sale of vast tracts of forest land Knowledge across the country.
of mall sales.
Knowledge of the great Indian sale.
More people knew that the popular fast food joint doesn’t sell mutton burgers than the fact that there are very few or no sparrows left in their neighbourhood. Knowledge about burgers. Sparrows? Are those big black thingys?
The nests of weaver birds that once dotted the landscape are gone. The owls are gone. The vultures are gone. Even the sparrows are gone. Their tracks covered by soot and grime that spews out of engines. Every day, common people cut trees on the roads to make way for parking. Every day the cheeseburger sells a little more. And then some. Nobody living in their plushed, square feeted, carpet area-ed, and concretised gardenias and forestias and nature-vistas asked where did the sparrows go? The question would have led them to the answer that the decline of the sparrows may be, amongst other reasons, ‘because of unscientific proliferation of mobile phone towers. These towers emit a frequency of 900-1800 MHz, continuous penetration of EMR (electromagnetic radiation) through the body of birds would affect their nervous system and their navigational skills. The radiation is making humans suffer a host of diseases as well. A recent study by Tehelka lists hundred of spots in Indian cities as having radiation levels six to seven times over the safe limits. So who should care about the sparrows? We should. For, the decline in the sparrow population means our cities are fast becoming unlivable.
The birds pictured above-left are the weaver bird and the sparrow. And the object above is the double cheeseburger. And you know which one comes with jalapenos and extra cheese, don’t you?
Can we have our country back? The look on the faces when they say it, “India is a growing market!” The sense of pride oozes out from a million guts of businessmen and politicians and economists and spreads like darkness. Advertisements in newspapers which shout: If you want a jog, head for the 30th floor. Wonder if India didn’t turn into a growing market, and just an amazing country as it used to be, what would happen? Would we have a better public transport system instead of a zillion, and growing, cars? Would we have more green spaces in the cities and not buildings with terrace gardens which don’t know their petunias from plastic? Would we be taking more interest in reviving our rivers than pledging, as an advertisement proclaimed, ‘we will have a certain brand of mineral water this year’? Would we be talking about our nation’s food security and not giving it away to biotech companies? Would we care a little more about the indigenous people and their way of living and not rush to buy mining companies’ shares? Would we start queuing outside our politicians offices with questions and not outside malls for bumper discount sales? Would we really study Gandhi and not go crazy over the model of economics gone wrong? Would we care a little more about which birds we spot in our everyday life and not just pretend ‘we just don’t see’? Would lesser number of tigers end up in Chinese restaurants and as rugs where egos land? If India was a country and not a market, would we step out of the malls, look around at the infrastructure and dying rivers and ghettoed greens, and think to ourselves, “Hold on, this isn’t progress!” If that is so, then we want our country back. We want to be able to say, India is an amazing country. And not try to contain it and define it by a word called ‘market’.
Figure 1: The portrait of a mall-hopping Indian.