Hyderabad: Amidst lockdown, 22nd April 2020, is a historic day in New Delhi and perhaps globally, for it shall be the cleanest Earth Day, since 1970. John McConnell, the creator of the Day, maybe smiling in heaven finally, due to lack of noxious clouds and vapour trails. The increased oxygen might have made the angels, slightly euphoric too.
But cosmic events aside, can we conserve our planet? Pledge that air and water remain clean and the economy is still blooming? As we introspect, it is clear that the ‘conquest of nature’ has got us to a precipice of planetary doom.
The environmental degradation is the gravest threat to Human life, second only to nuclear war, and has very serious geopolitical consequences. Noam Chomsky recently on Democracy Now said that India and Pakistan, may go to nuclear war over shrinking water resources.
Overall the roost is cooked and Earth as we know it cannot take more violence. The pandemics and diseases are corrective reminders from Nature, that it’s time to steer away from the ecologically destructive design and recreate a new economy and a new world.
How can we create a new world? Do we renounce the material world, shed our responsibilities, choose a life devoid of technology and become a hermit in a forest? No. The coronavirus although is a charnel calamity, but it also does provide us with an opportunity to reduce mindless consumption and reimagine a new paradigm, where the air is healthy, waters are clean and birds sing in our cities again.
To survive climate change and extinction, we need to adopt five principles - Reduce, Reuse, Regenerate, Swadeshi and Agro-ecology; back into our lives and economy. We need a strong Green economy (non-polluting, Circular, renewable-based, etc) to rebuild India and the world. For the most part of the last century, technology has been used to destroy the Earth, we have to bridge the two now. The Industrial revolution 4.0 needs to be built on non-polluting, circular, and renewable based technology.
But where does this path begin? We begin this journey, by bringing an Earth Awareness into our lives. The Earth is alive, she is not mere dirt or water or mountains to be mined. She lives through us on this living planet. We have to reconnect with our land, our mountains or soils, and feel the humming of the Earth’s heart. The Earth is living, and her gifts are living, we have to respect her with dignity.
Once this consciousness fills us, the next step is to reduce our imprint on this planet. Each action or product we buy/use has an impact on this Earth. Yet all our parameters of success - big houses, many cars, etc, are ecologically lopsided. Reducing water, fossil fuel and electricity consumption is not only “smart” but economical too. We need to swerve off the consumption bandwagon and fossil fuel economy to discover alternatives.
The Earth has limited resources, and with each extravagance, we loot the future generation of their shares. We need to stop or reduce buying products that exploit other humans and the planet. Remember, each time you buy something to think hard, do I really need it? Does this harm me and the Earth?
Now a very simple way to reduce consumption is to reuse things. One can start by reusing gallons of RO outlet water for plants or washing dishes, or converting old clothes into blankets (Khatris). India is filled with innovative ideas of reusing and recycling things. Personally, we segregate garbage and we have not thrown out kitchen wastes for months now, instead, we compost- make soil or feed it to street cows.
One can also reuse ‘pee’ as fertiliser - rich in urea and phosphate for urban gardens. Waste as little as possible for a thing may have myriad reuses, so before throwing something, stop a minute and think, how can you use this some other way?
Discarding two negatives patterns of consumptions definitely adds up to one big environmental positive. Humans are not masters of the world, but in words of renowned American conservationist Aldo Leopold, mere “stewards of the land”. This land and earth we have received from our ancestors, but only borrowed it from our descendants. Our aim here is not to loot and pillage the - air, water, soil, while we enjoy the comforts of air-purifiers in our homes. And Carbon reductionism, viewing actions/climate action in terms of their carbon footprint only, is not the only solution. We have to take a positive and holistic approach of regeneration versus an isolated negative outlook of carbon reductionism.
Our efforts should not be to replace the fossil-fuel-economy with bio-fuels, or low carbon tech but reinvent the economy and our lives, with regenerative principles of creation and have a systems-based approach towards each compartment of our lives. We have to steer our economic and governmental outlooks towards biomimicry, biophilic design, ecological & circular economics. As an individual, think of your action as not isolated but as a whole that represents the entire world. Act in ways that add to this universe and complement it.
Mahatma Gandhi over a hundred years ago, outlined the solution for us. He called it Svadeshi economy. This is a system is pillared on self-sufficiency, dignity and local co-operation while having minimal or a positive impact on the environment. He imagined and wrote extensively on models to make each village self-sufficient, to the point “that is can defend itself from the whole world, if necessary.” This economy was a decentralised system of production, which shared surpluses and took from other what it could not produce.
It is about time we accept a Svadeshi 2.0 in India, aided by ecological technologies. This is not a negative process, which involved boycotting or hate, but a positive struggle to build self-resilience. As a family and as a nation, we have to reorient to produce all that we can ourselves. Medicines to food, should all be grown and made near us. Each one of us has the power over our decisions, and simply put, we should use as much as we can - local and sustainable products. Invest in Svadeshi and sustainability. Before you buy something ask yourself can I replace this, with something as good made locally or sustainably?
Now for the final pillar of this pledge - Agro-ecology. Industrial food systems including cattle and poultry farms have destroyed not only human health but plagued the Earth with cancer. Farmers suicides, cancer, foreclosures of small farmers, abuse and crime in rural communities all around the world are mere symptoms of a rabid production system. Our rivers are polluted with fertiliser and pesticides run-off and the consumer family is experiencing a plethora of diseases - diabetics, impotence to cancer. But only that fertiliser subsidies, cost Indian taxpayers a large sum.
But is Agroecology viable, ML Jat, Principal Scientist CIMMYT in a recent paper has proved so. Agroecology does not only provide healthier food, but the practice reduces chemicals and fossil fuels in our food system. It has provided eco-system services by cleaning waters, sequestrating carbon, normalising the nitrogen cycles and flavourful food.
So where can we begin? Start at your own home, grow a garden with veggies or plant herbs like coriander in a pot, but remember without chemicals. Try and grow something that you eat. If you can’t do that, reach out to a farmer who can grow food agro-ecologically for you. For those of us living in the cities, we need to advocate for urban gardens, where we can commune with the food we eat and let our children see that food comes from plants and not the Fridge.
The culmination of all these principles is the foundation of a Green economy, based on regeneration, economic empowerment and circularity. As the world has descended into economic darkness, India needs to emerge from the ashes of a broken economic and industrial system to embrace a new paradigm - Green economy. As observed by MK Gandhi, the swadeshi economy already runs through us. On this Earth Day we need to pledge for our Vasudeva Kutumbhakam family and embark on the path of science, resilience and the Earth.
