1057 Words Essay on environment: Can it be preserved?

Thee suffocating dust and smoke of the cities, horrifying sight of naked hills denuded of greenery, the frequent patches of white coloured ‘usar’ soil – all point to the fast deteriorating environment around us. While there is undoubted increase in the comforts and luxuries in the privacies of well-maintained homes, one has to go farther and farther from human habitation to breathe in unspoiled atmosphere.

The environmentalists are getting shriller and shriller in their indictment of authorities encroaching upon the virgin forests and secluded hills to make irrigation dams and generate hydro-electric power and displacing poor hill and tribal people. They do get a sympathetic hearing in academic and even some governmental fora, but the pressure of development-process is not able to dissuade the authorities from going ahead with the exploitation of hither-to protected bio-mass in hills and forests.
The question arises whether the environmental degradation has reached a point of no return or some remedial steps can reverse the process. Before venturing an opinion on this ticklish issue, we must take a stock of the degradation which has taken place.

With their tremendous genetic diversity, tropical forests are extremely fragile eco-system, highly susceptible to damage from human activities. Once damaged, it leads to interruption of nutrient cycling, loss of soil fertility, extinction of plant and animal species, soil erosion, down-stream siltation, flooding, and damage to irrigation systems and acute fuel-wood shortages. The effects ripple through agriculture, energy supply, water and nearly every aspect of life of more than one billion people. The end result is biological impoverishment and human suffering writ large.

The current estimate is that about 80000 square kilometres, an area the size of Austria, is lost, that is converted to non-forest uses, each year.
Air pollution is increasing unabated. Air pollutants, sulphur-dioxide, particulate matter, nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide go up and then come down nearly causing visibly dirty air, noticeable effects on human health and withering of plants near the source of emission.

The atmosphere is not a passive receptacle of pollution, it actively participates in complex chemical and meteorological interaction in which emissions are mixed, transformed and transported. Two global pollution problems have dramatised the environmental degradation – the Green House Warming and the depletion of Stratospheric Ozone. It has dangerous implications for human health. The greater ultra violet radiation from the sun reaching the earth can lead to skin cancer. Greenhouse effect is likely to bring about permanent changes in the climate in coming years.

As the population increases, more and more land is brought under cultivation. Desertification has followed as a consequence of overgrazing of rangeland. The natural vegetation then declines producing less organic matter to maintain soil fertility. Rain water does not percolate into the soil where it can recharge underground aquifers, and provide moisture to plants. Instead, the water runs off leaving behind the aptly named erosion pavement. More than 3 billion hectares of land about one-fourth of the earth’s land surface is susceptible to varying degree of desertification.

While decades are required to form the fertile top-soil, a devastating flood can take away the soil in a few days. Water-borne erosion has caused massive damage in China. China’s Huang River is 50%, silt by weight in some of its stretches. In India 13 million hectares are eroded by wind and 74 million by water, an astonishing one quarter of the country’s land resources. Like erosion, the salination and water-logging that result from poorly managed irrigation destroy an area’s agricultural potential.

The challenge the degradation of land poses is that man has to find ways to meet the needs of growing population without destroying the resource-base on which they depend. Man has to grow with the bio-mass not consume it. The bio-mass which sustains humanity has to be preserved and developed imaginatively. Although it will be futile to enter the debate whether man should curtail his wants or should strive hard to fulfil his ever increasing needs to attain full stature, at least this much is certain J that he has to postpone satisfaction of many of his immediate desires so that he can develop his resources to make the best use of them at a later stage.

Denudation of hills, thinning of forest-cover, degradation of soil and perceptible j fall in the charging of underground water are all portents of the environment undergoing I massive changes. Whether the deterioration of environment can be reversed is a \ question that looms large in the minds of world-leaders today. International dimensions | of environmental degradation have been recognised by the sensitive minds among I world leaders. Beginning with the U.N. Conference on the Human environment at jStockholm in 1972, a large number of international deliberations have been held among the governments and environmentalists of different countries to find out ways and means and chart out common strategies for preserving the environment.

In June 11992, the Earth Summit was held in Brazil to reach international agreement on steps |to be taken for environmental protection and sustainable economic growth. While countries like Germany have Green Party, an environmentalist political party, environment protection movements have spawned all over the world. In India, Chipko Andolan for preserving forests in hills and Narmada Bacho Andolan have contributed a great deal in compelling the authorities to take steps for preserving the bio-mass a the people directly dependent on it.

How far the efforts can succeed in arresting the environmental degradation? TI immense variety of flora and fauna of tropical forests is impossible to recover foreseeable future. Nor can the brown denuded hills be covered with green diffusic in the near future. The intensity of greed which devours the natural resources v\l always surpasses the intensity of constructive activity to revive the bio-mass. Still, AK of things can be done. Japan has made the survival of pollutant industries and vehicli a costly affair by taxing them heavily.

Soon they will be constrained to reduce o eliminate pollution to remain economically viable and competitive. Many nations and international agencies are engaged in discovering and harnessing non-conventiona sources of energy. Solar energy, wind and Tidal Energy, GobarGas plants are some o the renewable alternatives to total dependence on fossil fuels which cannot bi replenished. Photo-voltic cells for harnessing solar energy are increasingly used fo heating water in cities. Determined efforts and research are likely to make the renewable energy sources cost-effective.

Many government and non-government agencies have launched ambitious programmes of afforestation. In many tribal areas, village forest communities are doing excellent job in planting and protecting trees. The success stories of these agencies need to be replicated in all parts of the country to increase forest cover at a rapid rate.
Healthy forests and green hills will keep the atmosphere clean, prevent soil erosion counter floods, produce higher rate of recharging of ground water, enhance the fertility and productivity of land and bring forth increased supply of food for men and fodder for animals.