"Rough
winds do shake the darling buds of May."
--William
Shakespeare
Land use in the country, over the last five decades, has undergone a drastic change- Land under agriculture has almost doubled, forest cover has dwindled to less than half, large tracts of fertile agriculture and forest land have been diverted by the so-called "developers" for urbanization and settlements. Deforestation contributes to loss of precious top soil which amounts to 35% of the global sediment load going (about 6000 million tons) to the oceans even though water flowing through our rivers is only 5% of the flow of the rivers in the world.
Excessive soil erosion with consequent high rate of sedimentation in the reservoirs and decreased land fertility has become serious environmental problems with disastrous economic consequences. Of the 16 rivers of the world which experience severe erosion and carry heavy sediment load, 3 rivers, namely, Ganges, Brahmputra and Kosi occupy the 2nd, 3rd and 12th position respectively. Since these trends have not been reversed, many other catchments of the Indian rivers are also becoming equally problematic as is evident from the ever-increasing Central assistance released to the States for floods, droughts and other natural calamities.
The combined effect of soil erosion, flood irrigation leading to salinity and water logging, excessive use of chemical fertilizers, insecticides and pesticides in the wake of Green Revolution has rendered almost 13 million hectares of irrigated land unfit for agriculture. Moreover, another 125 million hectares is estimated to be generally degraded. Agriculture yield, despite Green Revolution, still remains very low in the country. Subsidized provision of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, especially in the absence of adequate and timely irrigation has contributed to land degradation and lowered productivity. The situation is further compounded by a shift from indigenous crop varieties to higher yielding ones.
Since food security depends on land fertility, therefore, a National Program
on Afforestation and Development of Wastelands through the National Wastelands
Development Board was launched in 1985 with the objective of rehabilitating
5 m.ha degraded land annually. The responsibility for rehabilitation of
degraded non-forest and private lands was transferred to Department of
Waste Lands Development in 1992. Despite numerous schemes launched to ensure
public participation -JFM, Zile Ki Sabse Hari Panchayat, etc. -the scheme
has not been able to achieve its stated objectives so far. The challenge
is to attempt to integrate modern know-how of the foresters with the traditional
knowledge & experience of the tribal and local communities. Some important
prerequisites of a sustainable country are:
- Population stabilization in the next 15-20 years is a must to ensure an improved quality of life;
- Fertile agriculture land, just like forestland, needs requisite legislative protection from being diverted for settlements or other sundry "development programs".
- There is no substitute for improving agriculture productivity by atleast three fold.
Watershed Management and Command Area Development programs need to be implemented with the seriousness they deserve in place of just the lip service hitherto paid.
Write to :
PRATIDAN,
A-801, La-place, Shahnazaf Road,
Lucknow-226001 (INDIA)
Phone: 00-91-522-217875
Email:-
[email protected]
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