Tribal Priestesses Become Guardians of Seeds in Eastern India

NIYAMGIRI, India, Jul 22 2015 (IPS) – As the rhythmic thumping of dancing feet reaches a crescendo, the women offer a song to their forest god for a bountiful harvest. Then, with earthen pots...

Lessons from an Indian Tribe on How to Manage the Food-Forest Nexus

RAYAGADA, India, May 19 2015 (IPS) – Scattered across 240 sq km on the remote Niyamgiri hill range in the eastern Indian state of Odisha, an ancient tribal group known as the Dongria Kondh...

South Asia running out of groundwater

India, Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan along with China account for nearly half of the world’s total groundwater use and these regions are expected to  experience serious deficits, says the UN World Water...

Integrated Farming: The Only Way to Survive a Rising Sea

SUNDARBANS, India, Jan 8 2015 (IPS) – When the gentle clucking grows louder, 50-year-old Sukomal Mandal calls out to his wife, who is busy grinding ingredients for a fish curry. She gets up to...

Women on the Edge of Land and Life

SUNDARBANS, India, Nov 26 2014 (IPS) – November is the cruelest month for landless families in the Indian Sundarbans, the largest single block of tidal mangrove forest in the world lying primarily in the...

South Asia ranks high on climate risk index

 A global report ranks India, the world’s second most populous country, at the 10th position among countries in Asia at climate risk, based on the impact of extreme environmental events documented from...

Marine Litter: Plunging Deep, Spreading Wide

ATHENS, Oct 10 2014 (IPS) – Imagine a black-footed albatross feeding its chick plastic pellets, a baby seal in the North Pole helplessly struggling with an open-ended plastic bag wrapped tight around its neck,...

Facing Storms Without the Mangrove Wall

ATHENS, Oct 15 2014 (IPS) – As the cyclonic storm Hudhud ripped through India’s eastern state of Andhra Pradesh, home to two million people, at a land speed of over 190 kilometres per hour...

Look Who’s Helping Olive Ridley

GANJAM, India, Mar 27 2014 (IPS) – When Olive Ridley sea turtles nest on the beach in his village, little Warthy Raju can barely wait for the millions of hatchlings, with their three-inch shells...

U.N. Pushes Climate-Smart Agriculture – But Are the Farmers Willing to Change?

KARNAL, India, Sep 17 2014 (IPS) – United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is expected to make a strong pitch to world political leaders at the U.N. Climate Summit in New York on Sep. 23...