Ecology and Environment

Featured Articles
December 16, 2022
Healthy soil critical to human health and for achieving SDGs
Soil research must focus both on technology development and implementation
The ability of soils to support soil functions or services is decreasing (Image: Katrin Park/International Food Policy Research Institute)
November 25, 2022
Categorising watersheds for freshwater ecosystem conservation in India
These maps at the watershed scales have been made to not only ensure inclusion of different freshwater ecosystems, their connectivity and hydrological processes, but can also provide a spatial context for conservation decisions.
A stream at Anini, Arunachal Pradesh (Image Source: Roshni Arora)
November 16, 2022
Improving community resilience in ecosystem-based disaster risk reduction in India
Adoption of hybrid solutions - grey and green structures appropriate for resilience building
Healthy wetland ecosystems help in reducing disaster risks and managing climate risks (Image: Pxhere)
October 30, 2022
Slow disaster: Political ecology of hazards and everyday life in the Brahmaputra valley, Assam
This book by Dr. Mitul Baruah presents a fascinating, ethnographic account of the challenges faced by communities living in Majuli, India, one of the largest river islands in the world, which has experienced immense socio-environmental transformations over the years, processes that are emblematic of the Brahmaputra Valley as a whole. This is an excerpt from the book.
Floods are recurrent phenomena in Assam (Image: Mitul Baruah)
October 6, 2022
Deteriorating landscapes and threatened ecosystems of Jammu and Kashmir
Rapid urbanisation and faulty land use policies are rapidly destroying forests, grasslands and wetlands in Jammu and Kashmir, India and the ecosystem value services they provide. Can these valuable ecosystems be saved?
Deteriorating ecosystems of Jammu and Kashmir, India (Image Source: tkohli at Flickr via Wikimedia Commons)
July 14, 2022
Ichamati: River of poetry is dying a slow death
The river is faced with the dual problem of flood plain encroachment and growing levels of water pollution
Illegal transverse check dams (Badhals) built on Ichamati near a village in Basirhat (Image: Prithviraj Nath @ TheWaterChronicles)
Environmentalists protest proposed projects near Konkan coastline
News this week
Swati Bansal
Posted on 09 Feb, 2016 12:48 PM

Activists stand against three proposed projects near Konkan coastline
A thermal power plant in Ennore, Chennai (Source: India Water Portal Flickr Photos)
Eight ministries now responsible for Ganga clean up
Policy matters this week
Swati Bansal
Posted on 09 Feb, 2016 12:39 PM

Seven ministries other than the Water Ministry to help revive the Ganga
Ganga at Gadmukteshwar (Source: India Water Portal Flickr Photos)
Development or drastic ecological changes: Where is Dehradun headed?
Inspite of Dehradun being declared as an Ecologically Sensitive Zone 30 years ago, we couldn’t safeguard its fragility. Will the so called 'Smart City Plan' by UHUDA really help?
Anita Sharma
Posted on 05 Feb, 2016 11:49 AM

The Babur Nama mentions that the “
The changing face of Dehradun (Source: Wikipedia)
Unnatural world: National parks and climate change
Poachers, citizens and sometimes animals themselves are threats to the parks but the biggest new threat is climate change. Do our national parks stand a chance of surviving it?
Chicu Lokgariwar
Posted on 01 Feb, 2016 03:39 PM

Forest guards in India have fought many things over time in the course of their daily work--poachers, irate citizens, even animals at times! But they are now facing a threat that may well be beyond their capacity to overcome. A threat that is not just responsible for the death of individual animals, but for the destruction of entire groups of species--climate change.
A herd of elephants cross the Ramganga river at Corbett National Park
Can recurring droughts in Maharashtra be offset by participatory groundwater management (PGWM)?
Three different methods using PGWM that resulted in better water management demonstrate that hydrogeology can become a catalyst for villages to come together to plan and achieve water security.
Aarti Kelkar-Khambete
Harshavardhan Dhawan
Posted on 20 Jan, 2016 09:02 AM

Maharashtra is the fourth state following Karnataka, Chattisgarh, and Madhya Pradesh to seek out relief from the Union government thanks to more than 15,000 of its villages across Marathwada and parts of Western Maharashtra reeling under drought in 2015 [1].
The role of PGWM to deal with droughts in Maharashtra (Source: IWP Flickr photos)
International dialogue on Himalayan Ecology
Dialogue Highway in collaboration with the Centre of Research on Himalayan Sustainability and Development will host an international dialogue on Himalayan Ecology at Shoolini University, Solan
Posted on 19 Jan, 2016 11:30 PM

About the event:
The semi-arid regions of the Moyar-Bhavani basin
State sponsored policies and programmes must be sensitive to promote sustainable developmental activities in this already fragile social ecological system in Tamil Nadu.
Prathigna Poonacha
Tanvi Deshpande
Posted on 17 Jan, 2016 10:56 PM

Today's rural poor operate in highly risky and uncertain environments. Grappling with multiple stresses like eroding natural resources, poor assets and increasing climate variability, they are constantly adjusting their lives and livelihoods--changing a crop grown, digging another well, or migrating to a nearby town.
Large population of scheduled caste, and other communities reside in or around protected areas of the basin.
Lessons on ecology from the Apatani tribe in Ziro Valley
The Apatani tribe in Arunachal Pradesh is known for its paddy cum fish agriculture. They practice this as well as other sustainable water management techniques that allow them to coexist and thrive.
Usha Dewani Das
Posted on 17 Jan, 2016 03:42 PM

Ziro Valley, which figures in the tentative list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites as a unique cultural landscape, sits at a height of 5600 feet in Arunachal Pradesh. It is inhabited by the Apatani tribe who are completely confined to the valley.
Rice fields at Ziro valley with sacred groves in the backdrop
NITI Ayog allocates Rs 1000 crore for groundwater contaminated zones
Policy matters this week
Swati Bansal
Posted on 11 Jan, 2016 09:48 PM

Government to install community water purification plants in water toxic zones
A hand pump in Madhya Pradesh (Source: IWP Flickr Photos)
Ken-Betwa river gets some respite
Statutory clearance not given for the much touted Ken-Betwa model link project of the Interlinking of Rivers programme due to extreme social and environmental concerns.
Amita Bhaduri
Posted on 08 Jan, 2016 01:03 PM

In December 2015, more than forty years after it was conceived, the Government was set to launch India’s ambitious 30-link river interlinking project linking 37 rivers.
View of Betwa river (Source: Manual Menal, Wikimedia Commons)
Subscribe to Ecology and Environment
×