Book Review: Environmental Issues in India The Varying Shades Of Green

Business World, September 2007 Most people including conservationists think that when a species is in trouble, all it requires is a chunk of protected forest. However, in a high population density India, there are several other constituents or stakeholders involved — local people utilise the forest to graze their cattle and/or collect plant material for a living. How to deal with these people has split the conservation community in two. While one group argues for their relocation out of the forest, the other advocates giving them rights to the forest. Arun Agrawal and Vasant Saberwal, for example, argue that “cultural sensibilities have combined with an overarching concern with human impacts on the environment, to generate conservation rhetoric on the need to keep people and livestock out of protected areas”. A few chapters later, Ullas Karanth cautions against confusing conservation issues with livelihood issues and concludes “sacrificing the remaining 3 per cent or so area under wildlife reserves is unlikely to make any dent on human problems, which we have been unable to solve by using and abusing the remaining 97 per cent of the land area”. The relocation lobby tacitly backs the third main constituent, the forest department whose mandate is to conserve these forests despite obvious mismanagement, while the other side views it as an adversary that denies people their traditional rights while selling out to Big Industry. Who is the better guardian of the forest has become the fundamental question fissuring the conservation community. Understanding the political tangle that includes the aspirations of local people, the limitations of the forest department and the need for landscape conservation, can reduce the increasing polarisation within the Indian conservation community. This is precisely what this reader offers. The anthology of 33 essays is a first for India and promises to be an indispensable tool for anyone interested in Indian conservation and environmental movements. The book spans timelines and histories of various regions, peoples and struggles. India is a microcosm of dilemmas facing much of the developing world that seeks to balance the survival needs of people and wildlife ........................................................................................ full review at: http://janakilenin.blogspot.com/2007/09/book-review-environmental-issues-in.html