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Resource centre on India's rural distress
 
 

India's Cow Crisis Part 3: Brutal to kill India's ancient Uber economy -Sunita Narain

-Down to Earth

Sunita Narain on cow-vigilantism, cattle trade and the collapse of the livestock economy of India


I would not advocate vegetarianism. When I reasoned this out in this column a few years ago, I received the usual insults. Environmentalists are expected to be vegetarian, or better vegan! But what many didn’t register was my emphasis: “I am saying this as an Indian environmentalist; not global or western environmentalist.”

My argument has been that Indian farmers practice an agro-silvo-pastoral system and that livestock is a crucial part of their economy. Taking away the meat would demonetise their assets. It would kill their income. I argued that it is the quantity of consumption and how we produce that matters the most to environment. Industrialised meat production is done at the cost of the environment—by clearing vast forests, feeding animals cereals, antibiotics and all the other junk that they should not be using. But Indian farmers still practice cow-buffalo-goat economy that is of small scale. In fact, this economy has been sustainable for the fact that it is in the hands of small farm owners. Animals are their insurance policy; their ways of managing bad times, made worse today because of climate change-induced variables and extreme weather.

Please click here to read more.

Please click here to access Part-2 of the story.