The village ecosystem is composite, compact, and resilient. It generally composes forest, agricultural land, and water bodies. The environmental pollution is at the minimum in a village ecosystem.
However, the accumulation of forest litters, agricultural waste, cow dung, household and other waste rich in organic matter emit a lot of methane due to decomposition and putrefaction. Organized collection and scientific treatment of such waste material would help improve sanitation and health. Organic waste treatment in biogas plant can generate methane gas and slurry. Methane can be used as fuel for kitchen, street light, running fan and the slurry could be used as organic manure for agricultural crop and kitchen garden.
The village ecosystem is an entity of community conservation of forest, agriculture and water bodies which is the backbone of rural and tribal economy. The village communities live close to the forests and have been its custodians inherently. They are the protectors and never destroyers of the natural forests.
They collect materials from the forests for house construction, agricultural implements, day to day needs and various other purposes. They use wood, leaf and bark of Sal, bamboo and different other plants for house construction. The materials used are available within one km radius of stay for which no mining or any processing industry is required. The pharmaceutical industries of all faith (ayurvedic, homeopathic, unani, sidha, allopathic, etc.) make their preparations from the raw materials derived out of the natural plants and plant parts procured from village forests.
Deforestation accounts for up to 20 percent of the global greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming, according to the World Bank. One acre of forest absorbs about 1,587 kg of carbon dioxide, while a single adult tree on an average absorbs 6 tonnes of it. The Odisha coast stretch of over 480 km long was once upon a time covered with thick mangrove vegetation.
Unfortunately the entire coast is denuded of such vegetation except a few sporadic patches at Bhitarkanika, Mahanadi, Subarnarekha, Devi-Kauda, Dhamra, and Chilika areas. Mangrove plants act as good coastal shelter belt and are used for construction of house and fishing boat, making of agricultural implements and furniture, fire wood, charcoal, fodder, medicine, tannins, etc. Before 1940 in the delta region of Mahanadi the areas were full of mangroves. In 1960 for the Paradip Port construction 2500 hectares of mangrove forest was cleared.
This is one example of how natural mangroves have been sacrificed for development activities. Mangrove green belt is an efficient carbon dioxide sequester.
The Indian Forest Act of 1927 had provision for constitution of ‘village forests’ to meet local needs. The forest policies of colonial India continued into the post-colonial period, as exemplified by the National Forest Policy of 1982, which reinforced the right of the State to exclusive control over forest protection, production and management.
Just as the fulfillment of imperial needs was the priority of colonial forest policy, the demands of commercial industry became the cornerstone of post-colonial forest policy. Large tracts of forests were diverted for mining, industry, hydro-electric dam projects, agriculture, and other development projects in the years after independence. The Wildlife Protection Act of 1972 and the Forest Conservation Act 1980 seriously eroded the tribal people’s livelihood security from forests.
However, Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006 (FRA) is an attempt to acknowledge the tenural rights of tribes and other forest dwelling communities. In India 1,70,000 villages with 147 million population are located in forest vicinity.
The National Environment Policy (NEP) 2006 is a response to our national commitment to clean environment, mandated in the constitution in Articles 48A and 51A(g), strengthened by judicial interpretation of Article 21. It is recognized that maintaining a healthy environment is not the State’s responsibility alone, but also that of every citizen. There are a series of important International Conventions and Protocols on climate change beginning from the Stockholm Conference in 1972, Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) Global Convention 1992, up to the Paris Climate Summit 2015 and after.
Corona virus imposed a new situation in 2020 on environment and economy. A survey conducted recently discloses that in Maharashtra 94 per cent of Covid-19 cases occurred in urban areas while only 6 per cent occurred in rural areas. Similarly in Karnataka 92 per cent of it was observed in urban areas compared to 8 per cent in rural areas. However, with hordes of migrants returning, there could be the double-whammy of the spread of Covid-19 and the worsening of the socio-economic situation in rural areas. The Union Government budget in the current year and Corporate Social Responsibility funds should justifiably focus attention to strengthen the resilient village ecosystem and the healthcare infrastructure and capacity building in order to mitigate the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic in rural areas as much as possible.
A resilient ecosystem or ecological resilience can only save the humanity from the disaster of climate change due to global warming. Time has come for us to exercise restraint and withdraw from greed of reckless use of natural resources paying scant regard to purity of the nature.
Let us try to give healing touch in a way that does not lead to loss of ecological resilience of Nature. ‘Ecological Resilience’ means the capacity of the ecosystem to absorb disturbance or stress and remain within its natural variability. A resilient ecosystem resists damage and recovers quickly from stochastic disturbances such as fires, flooding, windstorms, insect population explosions, proliferation of virus and other microorganisms, and human activities such as deforestation and the introduction of exotic plant or animal species.
The village ecosystem is the best resilient ecosystem as it renders multifarious services such as water storage and retention, erosion control, carbon sequestration, regulating carbon, oxygen and cycles, harboring pollinators, biological control, building up immune system, food production, transforming energy from the sun into stored chemical energy, genetic resource, and cultural milieu.
(Dr Patro is president, Orissa Environmental Society snpatro11@gmail.comPhone: 9437190420)
