These days everyone seems to be interested in making the world a better place. They want better governance, better utilisation of resources. They want to make Government and other organizations to take reponsibilty. But I'm going to ask one question, How many of us are ready to accept responsibility and do something for a better world?. Its easy to blame others for what is happening, it is hard to own responsibility and do something about it. I'm going to write a series of blogs on different issues destroying contemporary India.
Desertification
The defiinition in Wikipedia is"Desertification is a type of land degradation in which a relatively dry land region becomes increasingly arid, typically losing its bodies of water as well as vegetation and wildlife. It is caused by a variety of factors, such as climate change and human activities. Desertification is a significant global ecological and environmental problem."
Now, I know most of the people who are reading this are unaware of the fact that 1/3rd of all the land in India is at a verge of Desertification. No one seems to care about it, though it is as important as climate change and whose effects are immediate and drastic. A report submitted to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) by the Environment Ministry in fourth week of April 2013 described that one third of India’s geographical area is undergoing the process of desertification despite of the efforts made by it to combat the problem. But what are the effects of desertification? is it really serious? whose responsibility is it anyway? what is causing it? What can we do to stop it?, these are some questions we are facing today.
India's growing population and dire need for food production to meet the population, exerts an enormous pressure on land. The socio-economic and cultural effects of desertification are disastrous.With 60% of the population depending on land for income directly or indirectly, it would be of huge economic consequence. Social effects like unrest, poverty and cultural effects like migration may be of dire consequences. So desertification needs our immediate attention.
Out of India's 328 mha total area nearly 69% of our land area is arid, semi-arid or dry sub-humid. A moajor part of these areas is prone to desertification. In report to UNCCD, MoEF has analysed land usage pattern in India with the help of ISRO concluded that 106 mha i.e 1/3rd of area is undergoing desertification.
The causes of desertification are vegetal degradation, water erosion, wind erosion, wind/eolian degradation, frost shattering, salinity/alkalinity, mass movement, water logging, rocky areas/barren land, man made, frost heaving and others.
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| Process wise distribution of the area under land-degradation for India |
Lets look at the causes one by one.
Vegetal degradation: it is observed mainly as deforestation/ forest-blanks/ shifting cultivation and degradation in grassland/grazing and scrubland. This happens in both warm and cold areas.
Water erosion: Sheet erosion/rill network/ shallow gully erosion fall mainly under this category. It comprises mainly of agricultural land.
Wind erosion: mainly happens in the close proximity of deserts mainly because of lift and drift effect of wind
Salinization/ Alkalinization: Mainly in cultivated lands because of excess ground water usage, soil erosion, usage of different insecticides and pesticides.
Water wasting: happens due to rock, regolith and debris movement down hill due to land slides, creeping.
Man made: though most of the above causes are indirect effects of man made causes. There are a few direct causes like Mining, brick kiln, industrial effluents, city waste and others
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| Desertification map of India |
If we see above pattern, almost all the causes of desertification are man made directly or indirectly. Indirect causes like global warming, deforestation, unregulated cattle grazing, excessive usage of pesticides and insecticides, over exhaustion of ground water and many others, while making a mess directly by mining, industrial effluents, city waste, improper drainage and others. There is no easy solution for stopping desertification, the first step towards it should be efficient utilization of resources by every individual, economic usage of ground water, awareness of renewable and bio-degradable sources of consumption and others. It would be hypocritical of us, if we just accuse the Government and others of not maintaining India in perfect health, when we the people are causing the problems and not doing anything about it.
regards,
Shiva :)
Reference
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