Climate friendly lifestyle practices in India

"The environmental consequences of unsustainable lifestyles and patterns of production and consumption are now widely acknowledged. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) are mainly driven by population size, economic activity, lifestyle, energy use, land use patterns, technology and climate policy." "Prepared for Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) by WWF-India, with contributions from Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH), Sahapedia and Development Alternatives (DA).

CMFRI to formulate action plan for sustainable management of marine ecosystem Business Standard dated 1st July 2017

The Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI) will take a lead role in formulating a national-level action plan for the sustainable management of marine and coastal ecosystems of the country. As per the direction of the NITI Aayog, the premier think-tank of the Government of India, the CMFRI will collaborate with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF)-India to draft the management strategies for strengthening the resilience to achieve healthy and productive ocean ecosystems, the institute said in a release here today. In a combined effort, the NITI Aayog, CMFRI and WWF-India will jointly organise a two-day brainstorming session of eminent marine biologists, environmentalists, technocrats, fisheries experts across the country and senior officials of fisheries departments from all the maritime States and UTs on July 4 and 5 at the CMFRI, it said

Developing a Policy Framework for Promoting Better Management Practices in Four Cotton States in India

Cotton is an important cash crop for India, with widespread economic and environmental implications. The country is the second largest producer and consumer of cotton, with a vast majority of poor small farm holders being responsible for cotton production. WWF’s overall strategy for cotton is to move the mainstream commodity market towards sustainable production, by both increasing the demand for “sustainable cotton” from globally significant retailers and brands and by supporting farmers to move towards more sustainable and economical cotton production methods. The ultimate aim of this strategy is to reduce the ecological footprint (particularly, the water footprint) of the entire chain from cotton production to retail sale, ultimately showing positive impacts on key ecosystems and river basins. Towards this, WWF has developed Better Management Practices (BMPs) through field projects that promote the uptake of Better Cotton Initiative (BCI) compliance. WWF-India has been involved in the development of BMPs that have helped cotton farmers, as well as the environment, in two states. A WWF document says that the pilot project in the Godavari Basin in India has had far-reaching economic, ecological, and social benefits. In order to scale up the implementation of BMPs, there is a need to facilitate policies that promote sustainable agriculture. This working paper examine the respective state-level policy frameworks influencing agriculture and policy hindrances that restrict the uptake of these BMPs, and provide recommendations on policy scenarios that would facilitate the wider adoption of BMPs

The Working Women's Forum: a counter–culture by poor women

The Working Women's Forum in South India is a remarkable organisation with some 36,000 members, all of them poor working women. They are both urban and rural, and include marketeers, women who sell services, and women who work at home - beedi and agarbathi makers, laceworkers and others. Poor working women suffer five oppressions against which the WWF enables them to struggle - class exploitation, caste inferiority, male dominance, physical weakness, and a closed world. The WWF is a counter-culture, of reversals, turning pillars of normal Indian culture on their heads - class, caste, male dominance, hierarchy and directions of learning. To multiply its impact to touch more of the tens of millions of oppressed poor women in India involves decisions about priorities. One major question is whether others could learn with and from the Forum and start similar organisations elsewhere

Big Cities. Big Water. Big Challenges: Water in an Urbanizing World.

This paper applies the water footprint methodology to six megacities across Africa, Asia, and Latin America to explore the effect of urbanization on water use and demand and determine what measures need to be taken to meet this demand. Key threats to water resources in many or all of the cities studied include: water stress or scarcity, pollution and decreasing water quality, and vulnerability to extreme weather caused by climate change

CMFRI, WWF join hands to enhance productivity The New Indian Express dated 4th July 2017

The Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute(CMFRI) will join hands with the World Wildlife Fund(WWF)-India to draft the management strategies for strengthening the resilience to achieve healthy and productive ocean ecosystems.The NITI Aayog, CMFRI and WWF-India will jointly organise a two-day brainstorming session of marine biologists, environmentalists, technocrats, fisheries experts from across the country and senior officers with the Fisheries Departments from all the maritime states and UTs at the CMFRI on Tuesday and Wednesday

Interbasin Water Transfers and Water Scarcity in a Changing World: A Solution or a Pipedream?

The world is increasingly forced to face the challenge of how to ensure access to adequate water resources for expanding populations and economies, whilst maintaining healthy freshwater ecosystems and the vital services they provide. Now the growing impacts of climate change are exacerbating the problem of water scarcity in key regions of the world. One popular way for governments to distribute water more evenly across the landscape is to transfer it from areas with perceived surpluses, to those with shortages.While there is a long history of water transfers from ancient times, as many societies reach the limits of locally renewable water supplies increasingly large quantities of water are being moved over long distances, from one river basin to another. Since the beginning of dam building that marked the last half of the 1900s more that 364 large-scale interbasin water transfer schemes (IBTs) have been established that transfer around 400 km³ of water per year (Shiklomanov 1999). IBTs are now widely touted as the quick fix solution to meeting escalating water demands. One estimate suggests that the total number of largescale water transfer schemes may rise to between 760 and 1 240 by 2020 to transfer up to 800 km³ of water per year (Shiklomanov 1999).The wide range of IBT projects in place, or proposed, has provoked the preparation of this review, including seven case studies from around the globe. It builds on previous assessments and examines the costs and benefits of large scale IBTs. This report assesses related, emerging issues in sustaining water resources and ecosystems, namely the virtual water trade, expanding use of desalination, and climate change adaptation. It is based on WWF's 2007 publication "Pipedreams? Interbasin water transfers and water shortages".The report concludes that while IBTs can potentially solve water supply issues in regions of water shortage - they come with significant costs. Large scale IBTs are typically very high cost, and thus economically risky, and they usually also come with significant social and environmental costs; usually for both the river basin providing and the river basin receiving the water

The Economic Empowerment of Women: The Case of Working Women’s Forum, India

Dr.Jaya Arunachalam, recipient of Padmasri founded Working Women’s Forum in 1978 with an objective of social and economic up-liftment of poorest of poor women in Tamilnadu, India. Now WWF has more than 700,000 women members. This case study deals with how technology has helped these micro entrepreneurs to accomplish their business more effectively and efficiently and how it has introduced drastic changes to their lifestyle