WOTR Newsletter

Eco Logic - June 2011

Editorial

Tackling the triple threats...

-The Editor

Scenario 1: Food prices have nearly doubled between 2004 and 2008 and continue to remain high. Prices of staples like wheat, rice and maize doubled and tripled in the last five years. While a range of factors have contributed to food price rises, financial speculation in agricultural commodities, believe many, has magnified market volatility. There is a major concern that the commodities boom represents a new risk to financial stability.

Scenario 2: Biological diversity -- crop diversity -- the biological foundation of agriculture, the raw material of evolution in our agricultural crops is crumbling; A mass extinction is underway in our fields, in our agricultural system and thus our food security. And that this mass extinction is taking place with very few people noticing and even fewer caring. Read more.....

Sustainability Quotient

- Mihir Mathur

Have you ever thought that we all are walking talking forms of sunlight? Yes, sunlight. We are all derivatives of the earth's primary source of energy, the sun. Each day the earth receives 120,000 terawatts of sunlight; world wide, our energy consumption is .012% of that number. But instead of directly consuming this abundance of sunlight, we use its dirty ancient remains, fossil fuels. Fossil fuel is nothing but buried sunshine; hence it would be fair to say that our lives are now derivatives of ancient sunlight. The sunlight that fell on earth millions and millions of years ago converted to biomass and then to fossil fuels after various forms of chemical reaction. It is now our primary energy source, but could well turn out to be the nemesis of our runaway growth. Read more...

Bio-Diversity for the People!

-Sam Jewler

I first met Balu at the Eco-course in Darewadi, where he became inspired to write a book about his village and to catalogue its natural wonders for the purpose of preserving them. Last week I met him in his village, where he has come home to do field work for these projects.

I saw how serious he was when he came into the front room with a large plastic bag slung over his shoulder, plopped it down and began unpacking it. A few minutes later he was sitting on the floor in front of almost 100 jars of seeds and an array of bird feathers, snake skins, animal droppings, a book of dried plant specimens, and a bird's nest. Read more...

WOTR News – May-June 2011
WOTR’s revamps its website – check it out at www.wotr.org!

Sushil Bajpai, Director of WOTR, launched two recently developed simulation “Games” -“Water Budgeting” and “Transformations: a rural community simulator”. These games aim at helping grass root communities understand the issues related resource management. The games were launched at the first ever Conference on Systems Dynamics, held on May 5-6, 2011, Pune, India by System Dynamics Society of India. The Society is an international, nonprofit organization devoted to encouraging the development and use of system dynamics and systems thinking around the world. Read more....

So shall you reap...! 

-V.Rangaswami,

Edited by: Saisudha Hejmadi-Acharya

In the hot, dusty, water-starved regions of Mahboobnagar, Andhra Pradesh, is a small village whose rice fields stand shoulder-high. This is Damarigedda village. 14 farmers here stand with happy faces as they take away 31% more bags of rice than their neighbouring farmers. Read more...

Replenishing the right way

– Ankit Pahwa

As I descended from Pune-Nashik highway into Sattechiwadi (located at the foothills of Baleshwar-Sahyadri range, I had the distinct feeling of leaving the outer world. I thought about what would happen if one of us urbanites had to live here… no, I wouldn’t be able to do it.

After going about 4 kilometres down I could see three micro-hamlets. They are for the three different tribes who populate Sattechiwadi – the Thakars, Bhills and Kolis – and there was a temple of Mata Satteaai (Goddess Satteaai), from where Sattechiwadi gets its name. Sattechiwadi is a tribal hamlet with 83 households. Those 4 kilometres represented more than just physical distance   they were the distance between sustainability and consumerism, the distance between various half hearted government attempts to develop and their untouched beneficiaries. However, half the hike down and things start getting clearer. A picturesque landscape starts welcoming you, with a calm and soothing balance in place. You reach there and you see that change is a tangible attribute. Read more....

My Internship at WOTR

– Marc Siepe

I joined WOTR after being an intern for Andheri-Hilfe, a donor NGO for WOTR, in Bonn, Germany where I had become aware of WOTR´s work. My internship took place from March to June 2011 - the hottest season in India. I had flown to India three days before my work began to visit Mumbai: Too little time and too much struggle - as I learned quickly. For someone who travels to India for the first time, a week for acclimatization without sightseeing should be scheduled. I could not sleep and was not used to the heat and the food. Completely exhausted I arrived at the WOTR office in Pune on a Monday. I expected one or two weeks of introduction to get an overview of their work as I was used to it in Germany, but found myself in a more fast-paced work environment. I went to Ahmednagar to visit WOTR projects in the villages and get a closer insight into their work. Read More....

WOTR Newsletter  Archive:

Eco Logic (June 2011)

Eco Logic (May 2011) [2.91 MB,PDF]

Eco Logic (March 2011) [3.89 MB,PDF]

April 2009 [406KB,PDF]  

January 2009 [658 KB, PDF] 

Third Quarter 2008 [477 KB, PDF]