Tax rebate to promote rainwater harvesting

Various municipal corporations in the country are offering concession of property tax in exchange of a rainwater harvesting system. Is the scheme working?

World Cancer Day: 'Toxins in the environment are a major problem'

With the rise in the number of cancer cases reported in India every year, prevention and affordable treatment will become critical in battling the disease

How is fodder crisis rendering livestock vulnerable?

Today, India faces an acute fodder shortage that has left drought-hit farmers and livestock vulnerable. Jitendra finds out how fodder crisis has the potential to cripple India's rural economy

World ocean assessment warns of excessive pressures on ocean resources

The report has compiled environmental impacts of all human activities on oceans and warned that a failure to act quickly would pose the greatest threat to oceans

Save and Grow: a guide to sustainable cereal production

The technique focuses on conservation agriculture, maintaining soil health, selecting crops with higher yield potential and greater resistance to climate change and efficient water management

Meet thy neighbours

Every existence has its excuse, it is said. Every year taxonomists in India venture into uncharted landscapes and scan every nook and corner to find out many such existences and unveil the excuses. In the past year they found 523 species of animals and plants. Down To Earth introduces a few of the country's newest citizens to you, each of them equally contributing to the megadiversity of India

Indian Science Congress: assessing progress and challenges

Why this abandoned village is a threat to Uttarakhand

People are abandoning their villages despite high economic growth, leaving behind few, who find it difficult to continue farming without community support

International Mountain Day: Highland people to face vagaries of weather, food insecurity

Released on the occasion of Mountain Day, two reports highlight climate threats to high altitude areas

CAG assesses performance of ministries

The Comptroller and Auditor-General of India had submitted 16 performance reports on various sectors to the Finance Ministry and they were tabled in the Parliament 

2015: The year that was

Taking stock of developments of the year   

Why better sewage management in Chennai will help fight floods

Down To Earth Editor Sunita Narain explains how the city's three rivers and 320 tanks and lakes that worked as flood barriers are used mostly for dumping sewage

Labour exit

Labour shortage in agriculture forces Indian farmers to innovate to stay afloat

Where dry gardens wilt

India is one of the 17 megadiverse countries, with over 11 per cent of the world's plant species. Herbaria across the country store millions of rich biological samples, helping scientists to connect with the past and better understand evolution, extinction, climate change and even introduction of invasive species. But due to inadequate funds and little government support, these repositories …

A look at the changing scenario of Bihar politics

Of late, women have become the it factor in elections. Caste also plays a dominant role in voter polarisation

Plan of inaction

How the US president sold an unambitious plan to clean the power sector as historical

The season of death

Come winter, air pollution will breach record levels across cities, causing illnesses and several avoidable deaths. Where do our faults lie and what can we can do to correct them?

Does Volkswagen fraud signal death of diesel?

Making diesel vehicles clean, powerful and fuel-efficient is no easy task, and the Volkswagen cheating case has exposed this. This should act as a wake-up call for India, which is dieselising rapidly but lags behind developed countries by decades in enforcing stringent emission standards and monitoring strategies

Sending out a strong message to the Zero Hunger Generation

The main challenge now is to engage young people to sustainably eradicate hunger and poverty globally by 2030

'Social protection: a safety net for agricultural households'

In the run up to World Food Day on October 16, a Food and Agriculture Organization report focuses on the role of social protection in breaking the cycle of rural poverty