Molecules of death

These are victims of an ill-fated war fought 30 years back. The war is over but its toxic backlash lingers. One weapon of the war is still wreaking havoc -- Agent Orange, a herbicide containing tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (tcdd). From 1962 to 1971, the us military aerially sprayed 42 million litres of Agent Orange to deny the communist fighters forest cover.

REVIVING WISDOM

water harvesting is no longer a subject for academic discussions or committee room confabulations. It is a living subject today for thousands of devotees whose numbers are growing by the day. Today 5,000, five years later 50,000, and 10 years after 500,000 -- that is, one rainwater warrior in every village of India.

Hold Up!

For the first eight days, negotiations went exactly as expected.

Tryst with rain

In our January 15, 2000 issue, Down To Earth had highlighted the situation in drought-struck areas of Gujarat. The conclusion was that villages with structures to harvest rainwater were faring much better than villages which had forgotten the value of rain (see: 'Standing the test of drought', Vol 8, No 16). They had enough water to drink; some had enough for irrigation, too.

Singapore: Breathing Easy

Peak hour traffic scenario in India is a cartoonist's delight. Hassled motorists, rivers of sweat streaming down their forehead, accusing each other for lack of traffic sense in loud voices toned by the honking of a thousand horns. This is not so in Singapore. It is almost legendary now that one of Asia's wealthiest cities has one of the calmest traffic, too.

Polluted and ignored

Each resident of Delhi is familiar with it. And when friends and relatives from the smaller cities and towns of India come visiting, they hardly miss an opportunity to remind the residents of the extreme pollution in the capital. The time has now come for Delhiwallahs to start pointing out that the air of most smaller cities and towns in India is as polluted as Delhi, or is fast becoming so, even if it does not attract wide public attention.

Fabled Fruits!

Dwindling diversity India holds the distinction of being the world's second largest producer of fruits, both major and minor. But many of the fruits native to India are being less and less savoured

Destination Saturn

the countdown for Cassini's launch had more than its share of the drama. For the first time in the history of space exploration, people protested against the launch of a spacecraft. Most of them were convinced that using plutonium to fuel the rockets attached to the probe was risky. Cassini carries 32.6 kg of plutonium-238 for propulsion. The chances of the nuclear fuel exploding were remote.

Warm-up to kyoto

global warming is not imaginary. Most scientists agree that greenhouse gases have been accumulating in the atmosphere, leading to the greenhouse effect. Greenhouse gases ( ghgs) such as carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide are produced naturally. However, industrialisation has led to a steep rise in their emissions.

In a favour of a lesser good

The less fortunate have had their say, and elephants must pay their way to conservation. Three southern African nations -Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia -have been given the go-ahead to trade in elephant products at the 10th Conference of Parties (COP) of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), which concluded on June 20 in Harare, Zimbabwe.