Environment

Highlights from the issue

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DTE Staff

Sunita Narain's Desk: Inclusion is sustainability

We cannot neuter politics of access, justice and rights, and hope to fix environment or indeed development

Civil Lines: No good day for a night

Znamya-2, which was deployed as part of a series of orbital space mirror experiments in the 1990s by Russia.

Reflect Orbital's on-demand sunlight business will have impacts on environment, including human health, wildlife and agriculture, and astronomy

First take: Cancer's unequal burden

As the world celebrates Elon Musk’s trillion-dollar feat as a sign of success of the growth model, some ask why has poverty remained so persistent

Special report: Easy to displace

Protesters express anger by staging symbolic hangings during the protest, which lasted from April 5 to 16.

The Ken-Betwa river linking project has become synonymous with environmental destruction and forcible relocation of thousands of tribal people

Interview: The project will have severe consequences, says Himanshu Thakkar, convener of South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People

Video: What is up with the Ken Betwa River Linking Project?

Photo feature: Ken-Betwa link leaves tribal families fighting for fair compensation

Local tribal residents stage a symbolic pyre protest against the Ken-Betwa River Linking Project in Madhya Pradesh’s Bundelkhand region.

Factsheet: Unsaved potential

With reports of water scarcity and “day zero” conditions increasing every year, urban India's water stress is only growing in magnitude and impact. But the despair can be mitigated through effective rainwater harvesting mechanisms that allow cities to catch water when it falls

Cover story: Ancient signals

Recognition and integration of indigenous knowledge systems can strengthen climate policies

Column: The hidden lexicon

Language functions as an archive that encodes adaptive ecological knowledge, with observations embedded in local lexicons through specific words, proverbs and sayings

Interview: ‘Recognise indigenous solutions’

Understanding indigenous practices is crucial for climate change adaptation, says Annamária Lammel, anthropologist with Université Paris 8, France and author of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment reports

Special report: New route to pasture

Over the past five decades, sheep numbers in Himachal Pradesh have tripled, goat numbers have risen fivefold, and the number of families dependent on pastoralism has increased tenfold

Himachal Pradesh has lifted a 56-year freeze on grazing permits, and renewed efforts to count pastoral herds and recognise communities who depend on them

Special report: Dung dividend

Priyanka Devi of Sikhera village in Uttar Pradesh’s Bulandshahr district says she has sold about 120 kg of dung cakes in the past three months

Fuel shortage has not just made households treat dung as a valuable economic resource but also given a boost to companies dealing in dung-related products

Opinion: Making of Eurasia’s gateway network

For much of modern history, grand strategy has centred on controlling
chokepoints, from Suez Canal to Strait of Hormuz. Now the strategy is shifting
to emerging routes and who can connect networks that surround them

Opinion: The New York lesson

India should see New York’s pause on new data centres over environmental concerns as a glimpse of its own possible future

Patently absurd: India hobbled by industry’s failure to fund R&D

The chronically low investment in research and development by the
private sector has now reached a crisis point

Science: Hidden carcinogens

Nitrosamines are toxic compounds that get formed in processed food, even in treated water, but have still received little regulatory attention

Book: Life finds a way

Excerpts from The Story of Birds, in which plaeontologist Steve Brusatte shows how birds flying in today’s skies are descendants of dinosaurs that once ruled the Earth

In front: Pristine promise

Members of Tsomgo Pokhri Sanrakshan Samiti collect waste near the Tsomgo lake.

Sikkim villages ensure that Tsomgo lake, a popular tourist destination, remains free of waste