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Cover Story

The flush toilet system and the sewage system, which goes with modern day personal hygiene and cleanliness, are part of the environmental problem and not the solution. Consider the huge amount of clean water that is used to carry a small quantity of human excreta, Sunita Narain writes about the political economy of defecation. Manoj Nadkarni analyses the flush and forget mindset, which is increasingly destroying our water systems

Editor's page

Better wild than never

IT HAS taken 20 long years for the Indian wildlife community to even acknowledge that human beings exist and that "man-animal" conflicts are growing in and around our national parks and sanctuaries. And, I presume that if it has taken them 20 years to accept something that is pretty much under their noses, then it will take another 20 years to come up with solutions of how people can work with and not against conservation.

News

Vague verdict

Report on endosulfan raises more questions than it answers

Coastal decontrol

Yet another attempt by the government to ease CRZ curbs

Rooting out felling

Andaman officials cite livelihood issue to justify logging

Damning report

Jharkhand police accused of using brute force to quell anti-dam drive

US shipping out 'spoils' of terror

Rubble from World Trade Center arrives in India to a hostile reception by environmentalists

Deep impact

Uttaranchal village resists, and succeeds in stalling, resumption of mining activity

Night flights face

Court's verdict on aircraft noise may amplify litigation

A law that lacks depth

Loopholes surface in Goa's new groundwater regulation

Science & Technology

Polluted Yangtze

Deforestation accelerating

Chilling effect

Mounting problem

Human activities are degrading mountain ranges worldwide

Threat of a retardant

Highest level of toxic pbde found in Virginia fish

Hidden advantages

Climate change records of amateurs are helping a lot in scientific studies

Befitting slow pace

A slowed down ocean circulation has led to Pacific Ocean releasing less amount of carbon dioxide

Look inside the whale

Scientists develop a method for studying the whales' stomach contents without killing them

Cancer vaccine

Environment not genes

Chimps and AIDS

Meat of the problem

Antibiotic resistant bacteria in meat on the rise

Lethal messenger

El Nio brings deadly disease to South America

AIDS vaccine delivers

Cellular attack against the virus works

Sweet lumps

Diabetes and obesity are related

Misguided shot

The Basel convention guidelines to manage plastic waste miss the point: reducing plastics is the real solution

Dirt bags or detergents?

The Indian detergent industry refuses to clean up its act

Special Report

Rivers(e) effect

The Andhra Pradesh government is all set to purify Musi river, which has been given top priority under the National River Conservation plan, by dumping effluents

Nepal's poor carry it off

As the Himalayan country's forestry scheme for the poor reaps rich dividends, its government entrusts more degraded areas to the underprivileged. The only hurdle for a complete environmental revival seems to be bureaucratic inertia

Life & Nature

Wings Of Change

Migratory birds stage a comeback after a long hiatus as Kashmir wetlands get a fresh lease of life

The Fortnight

Curative resolve

A dose of political will, backed by communication skills, can help combat infectious diseases

THAILAND

INDONESIA

NORTH KOREA

CHINA

ECUADOR

BRAZIL

JAMAICA

RWANDA

TANZANIA

ZAMBIA

IN TROUBLED WATERS

RAGING FIRES

ARSENIC CONTAMINATION

UNITED NATIONS

Saving the shark

Green palm oil

Brakes put on car use

Tainted meat

Sustainable power

Directive draws flak

Tax prop

INDIA

TANNERIES TO PAY

CORBETT HIGHWAY

WRONG RELEASE

Alarming dip

On the brink

Under the scanner

Curb cloning: Panel

Ecofriendly moves

FOLLOW UP

Sailing high

A sorry state, indeed!

COASTAL CURBS

AT CROSSROADS

FIGHTING FORGERY

Leader

Data-wise

The Union ministry of environment and forests recently held a symposium on environmental health. Sadly, nothing emerged from the initiative, well-intended though it might have been. Here was an opportunity to meet the challenge posed by the double burden of diseases and a deteriorating environment by involving our medical community - doctors, epidemiologists and health specialists. Instead, a routine round of meetings considered models from home and abroad. Period.

Unholy nexus

Enron is once more in news. As more and more skeletons are shaken out of its cupboards, a merry dance has begun. But the big issue here is the conflict of interests of bigwig Arthur Anderson. The firm was on one hand the consulting agency and on the other the power giant's auditor. Naturally, accountability is the first to go out of the window. But then for us it sounds all so familiar.

Crosscurrent

Manipulating Research

Private funding has given a new meaning to scientific research today. With rising corporate research budgets, academic institutions are leaning more on industry sponsorship and less on government or charitable foundations. A major fallout of this alliance is compromise on independence and objectivity. On the other hand, government-funded research has seldom yielded the desired results. With government failing to deliver the goods and corporate bodies stepping in to further personal interests, research-funding has today become a contentious issue

Media

Boon or bane?

Motor vehicle exhaust emissions are the primary source of ambient
carbon monoxide (CO) levels in most
metropolitan cities. People with coronary artery disease are particularly sensitive
to adverse effects of CO, which is formed due to incomplete fuel combusion
in a motor vehicle engine. Addition of oxygenates to gasoline mitigates this
problem.

During the winter months of 1992-93 at many places in US, methyl tertiary-butyl ether (MTBE) oxygenated gasoline

Empowerment

A MUCH publicised event in the last quarter of this century is the decentralisation of power which transfers volumes of responsibilities from higher level intitutions to grassroot level organisations with much emphasis on people's responsibility and government's transparency. The newly

Disaster Management

HINDU Kush-Himalayan (HKM) region - the youngest mountain system in the world - is characterised by unstable geological conditions and extreme weather events, triggering natural hazards such as debris flow and landslides. The peoples of this region suffer greatly from these disasters. Dissemination of knowledge on landslide management can help mitigate the hazards in the region. This in turn requires a multidisciplinary approach.

For a better tomorrow

ALTHOUGH many environmental policy studies are published, arguably few actually lead to changes in environmental policy. In most policy debates, each side can
produce a study containing "scientific evidence" to bolster its position. This leads to a great confusion. When dueling experts cite competing studies, public confidence in the value of such research is undermined. Many policy makers, unsure of how to interpret the disagreement among the experts, also often back away from taking any action.

Water crisis

THE book examines the interaction of nature and society through the lens of groundwater development. It explores how the nature shapes trajectories of changes in agrarian
societies and, in turn, how communities respond to changes in the natural resource base on which they depend.

www.projectcensored.org/

A project by Sonoma State University in California. This small liberal Arts institution through a network of researchers, volunteers and academicians lists 25 top censored stories of the year.

The listing of 2001 censored stories is led by the World Bank attempt to privatise water supply in Bolivia at the full cost pricing. The researchers find out the intricate channels between the Bank and corporate companies and their attempts to kill the story.

Presumed innocent

"CHEMICALS are presumed to be safe and to be innocent until they are proven guilty." The startling statement transforms into a shocking revelation as Bill Moyers sets out to ruthlessly expose the mechinations of powerful chemical industry in the United States which has hidden secrets for almost half a century.

Grassroots

Plastic purge

Chittaranjan township sports a new look as its residents say no to plastic carrybags

Letters

Naxalite menace

Your cover story 'Forest war' (Down To Earth, Vol 10, No 15, December 31, 2001) gives a new dimension to forest and wildlife protection. The Naxalites are taking advantage of the local dissent and spreading their nefarious activities all over the country. As a result, tribal belts in Midnapore, Bakura and Purulia districts of West Bengal are also gradually coming under the grip of these

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