-Outlook The aim of achieving food security across the globe will become increasingly elusive unless countries take into account the planet's nature-based services into agricultural and related planning, said a report released by the United Nations Environment Programme today. Safeguarding the underlying ecological foundations that support food production, including biodiversity will be central if the world is to feed the seven billion people, climbing to over nine billion by 2050, according to...

A scientific and public scrutiny of the methodology used by the expert panel will only add to the efforts to save the Western Ghats. On May 23, the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) posted the report of the Western Ghats Ecology Expert Panel (WGEEP) on its website honouring a landmark judgment of the Central Information Commission triggered by an activist seeking access to the material. In this judgment, the CIC...

The Government of India has formally launched the news Guidelines of the MGNAREGA based on the Mihir Shah Committee report. The news guidelines include many new works under conservation activities and it strengthens the hands of the village panchayats and gram sabhas. However, the list of works does not include the activities under the system of rice intensification (SRI) which encourages scientific method of paddy cultivation with better yield in...

Floods are vital to Kaziranga; dams on the upper reaches of the Brahmaputra could disrupt the balance A few weeks ago, much of the grasslands of Kaziranga National Park were under water. The monsoon floods bring with them their own set of problems—some of the animals, for instance, have to be rehabilitated—but they are required for the very existence of the park. The annual floods of the Brahmaputra creates grasslands, floodplains, and...

The tsunami in Japan has rekindled a debate on coastal protection with sections of scientists claiming that bad science has been used to wrongly portray mangroves as bioshields against tsunamis and waves from cyclones. Sections of environmental scientists and oceanographers have said the best defence appears to be mounds of sand and mud, and cautioned that it would be misleading to promote coastal vegetation as barriers against giant waves. In the wake...