Tag Archives: ecosystems

On Earth Day, connecting the dots…

I would’ve been about 16 or 17 when I came across Gavin Aung’s comic strip illustrating potentially the most famous excerpt from Carl Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot. To paraphrase, all of our pasts and futures, dreams and losses, wars and loves have taken shape on what is a mere speck in the gigantic scheme of […]

Biome Environmental Trust: Reclaiming vanishing waters

When the landscape of a city changes over time, when there is more demanded of it every day than it can provide, we risk reducing our natural environment to a mere reserve. How much of a thought can we spare it then? What happens to something that no longer holds our attention? We stop noticing […]

Rainmatter on the Road: A ‘sense of the house’ in Jharkhand

Below is Vikas’ account as he travels to three regions in Jharkhand and asks residents about their relationship to their ‘home’, pokes at the changing aspirations of rural India, and wonders if a transition from interventions to responses might be more meaningful.  Indian villages are a treasure-trove of resources, cultures and skills, traditionally passed down […]

Nature Conservation Foundation: Redefining conservation in a changing world

The climate crisis manifests differently across different regions. Its impact on varying wildscapes and species can take any form ranging from glacial melt in the snowy Ladakh, to the bleaching of corals along the coasts of India. That being the case, every region would have to ask its own questions, and explore its own unique […]

Farmers plant saplings on their land in Yelachatti village. Four farmers are relying on permaculture principles to grow crops, fruits and fodder on their 12-acre plot.

Fallow to fertile land, one farm collective at a time

A slow and gradual transformation is unfolding in Yelachatti.  This quiet village on the fringes of Bandipur National Park in the southern Indian state of Karnataka is where a few farmers are turning their parched and denuded farmlands into verdant fields.  Yet, this is not an ‘…and-they-lived-happily-ever-after’ fairytale. This is an account of marginal farmers, […]