In the current crisis of climate change, when will we take action towards the bond we have with nature?
There is a huge shortage of natural resources in our country as per population.
Our country has now reached to 18 per cent of the world’s population, but unfortunately, we possess only 2.4 per cent of global land, two per cent of forests and only four per cent of clean water. In the future, as population pressure increases, these resources will further go down. At the rate at which we are using natural resources now, by the year 2030 we will need 25 times more natural resources than now we are available with.
Ecological threats are increasing day by day, this will lead to more degradation. According to the Institute for Economics and Peace, if there is a 25 percent threat to food security, the risk of conflict in the country will increase by 36 percent and if there is a similar water shortage, then the incidents of conflict will increase by 18 percent. From the point of view of biodiversity, there are four hotspots in our country, but it is feared that 90 percent of the area of these places has also been reduced.
According to the United Nations, India suffers an average economic loss of seven billion US dollars every year because of natural disasters. This is why in the last five years, India’s rank in the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) has declined. In the year 2022, India was at 121st position. In view of all these incidents, there is a need for commitment towards natural bonds today.
Is this what we are replicating to the Nature? Whatever we have taken or are taking from nature till now, we should return to it in the same amount, this commitment is called natural bond. If we cannot repay, we are debtors of nature. Nature is not a financial institution, which gives us loans with full due diligence. This entire universe operates under the principle of co-existence.
Nature is the basis of our life, but we forget to repay what we need to return, we are just running towards luxuries and more convenient and surrounding which are comfortable for us. But at what cost, What kind of earth will we hand over to our coming generations? The crisis of Corona epidemic has taught us that in reality we are nothing in front of Nature and also we shouldn’t take it as granted.
The biggest factor behind our behavior of taking Nature as for granted because there are no such policy against the Exploiters, 4.5 crore people will be forced to migrate from their homes by 2050 due to climate disasters in India alone. At that time may we all realize that what we have lost in the search of Materialistic World. In an era of climate change, the number of people migrating as a result of extreme weather events will triple the current number.
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