This is the weekly bulletin bringing to you some interesting articles from UN Desk, covering topics across continents and borders. Africa: Balancing Morocco’s indigenous culture and conservation– The delicate balance between indigenous farming practices and conservation in Morocco is under threat, but according to the UN, local communities in the Western High Atlas Mountains are finding ways to preserve traditions and still make a living from the land. Americas: Murals help heal wounds of bloody conflict in Guatemala— “The villagers knew that the military kidnapped [indigenous] people and brought them here and tortured them. While alive, they were forced to dig their […]
Top 5 Global Environmental Concerns for 2019
Environmental concerns are on the rise with some becoming more critical by the year. UN has declared 2019 the year of Biodiversity, asking all of us to do our bit to save the environment and the various species inhabiting the planet. Below are few more environmental threats in need of mitigation.
Earth Day- Past & Present
The earth day is commemorated on 22nd April world over with several events. Every year, it comes as a reminder of things that have come to be and things that can be with respect to environment, and what can we as earthlings do to protect our earth better. This year’s theme is “protect our species” with the agenda of raising awareness about rate of extinction of species. The earth day celebrations were first initiated in 1970 by a US Senator from Wisconsin Gaylord Nelson. He proposed the initiative after having witnessed the enormous oil spill of Santa Barbara, California in […]
Environment at the Center of Agriculture Debate
Environment degradation and natural resource insecurity plays a significant role in geopolitical tensions and social instability world over. Though often underestimated, environment insecurity is one of the prime causes, directly or indirectly, of global events such as refugee crisis, civil wars, rise in populism among others. The UNHCR reports that natural disasters have displaced more than 26 million people since 2008. The refugee crisis is in fact marred by an environmental element, wherein natural resource scarcity, poor resource management and unstable agricultural practices are some of the main precursors. Syria serves as a case in point here. In the years […]
Geopolitical Realities of Resource Rich Africa (Part Two)
One of the salient aspects of the African geopolitics, as discussed in the earlier post, is the covetousness of African natural resources. Both the global powers and the emerging powers are interested in getting access to these African riches (environment resource), which in turn determines the nature of political relations between the countries and individual African States. However, natural resource richness can also lead to disparities within states threatening to hamper any kind of cooperation. As such, there are two factors influencing this fragmentation: Natural distribution of resources, making some countries more affluent than others. For instance, Africa is well […]
Geopolitical Realities of Resource Rich Africa (Part One)
Natural topography shares a complex relationship with the economy, polity and society of a country. Representing the geographical aspect— which includes physical landscape (mountains, waterbodies etc.), human elements and natural resources— it plays a critical role in shaping the international relations of States. This is reflected specially in case of Africa which is well endowed with natural resources, and has significant reserves of minerals and raw materials in comparison to the world; sometimes of minerals unique only to the continent, such as coltan. This has enabled the African nations to build strategic foreign relations and form geopolitical equations with countries […]
Cultural Heritage Has a Lot to Teach Us About Climate Change
While cultural heritage sites are under threat from rising sea levels and melting permafrost, indigenous knowledge such as that of Assam’s Majuli communities can provide the key to unlocking adaptive climate change strategies. (Republished from The Conversation and The Wire) Museums, archaeological sites and historical buildings are rarely included in conversations about climate change, which tend to focus on the wider impact and global threats to our contemporary world. Yet these threats impact everything, from local cultural practices to iconic sites of outstanding universal value. In light of this, it’s worth exploring the relationship between our heritage and the changing […]
India and its Energy Sovereignty
In recent times, India has been pitted to overtake Japan as the third largest economy by 2030 and yet the India’s macro-economy doesn’t seem to be robust as the rupee has continued to slide against downwards, and can be expected to be cheaper than ever by end of the year. Part of the problem lies in India’s dependency on oil imports. Until now India had a smooth ride owing to the oil price crash from $100 to $40. However, now the prices have climbed back to $75 making India vulnerable to factors such as inflation, increasing current account deficit and […]
THE POLITICS OF SUSTAINABLITY
The years 1992 and 2015 are historic for the environment movement, wherein each of the years witnessed important treaties and conferences, redefining plethora of academic and policy initiatives of past, present and future. Be it the Sustainable Development Goals, Paris Climate Treaty, Agenda 21 or Rio Declaration on Environment and Development among others. These signal to a major shift in international commitments to both sustainability and development. Conversely, pinning down the technical, normative or political definitions of sustainability is a difficult prospect. Over the years, especially due to rising incidence of natural catastrophe, it has come to resonate more with […]
Eradicating the Tuberculosis Epidemic from Indian Landscape
India bears world’s highest burden of tuberculosis (TB), accounting for more than one-fourth of all TB infections. As such in 2016, TB accounted for approximately 1.7 million deaths, reflecting that India, despite its focused and concerted efforts on behalf of diverse stakeholders, has a long way to go. In this light the Indian Prime Minister recently advanced the TB elimination goal by 5 years, given its control and prevention poses a challenge at multiple levels such as correct diagnosis, strong public health schemes, continuing medical treatment, drug resistance, funding, nutrition etc. Let us look at some of the macro- level […]
