Inside this issue
Renewable Energy
Biomass is a renewable energy resource derived from the carbonaceous waste of various human and natural activities.
Plant that Cures
The sweet leaf, also known as the honey herb, is nowadays being used as an alternative for sugar. It is also used to treat a gamut of problems from diabetes obesity, hypertension, physical fatigue, and heart burn to even dental decay as the leaves are endowed with significant medicinal properties.
Health Watch
The number of chemicals that are used in daily life is increasing at an exponential rate and are estimated to be about 50,000 with a total weight of 7 billion kg per year.
Development Indices
Poverty characterized by various facets of deprivation is such a big issue that it is described as the greatest development challenge facing the international community (United Nations Millennium Assembly of September 2000).
Opinion
The visual media, more than any other medium, thrives on hype. And where media images are produced by a particular class largely for its own kind, the ‘other’ is exoticised.
Child in India
We have launched an ambitious polio eradication programme in the country. Although hounded by myths, that as polio immunization is actually a ploy to sterilize the common masses, the programme has been largely successful.
Many community based conservation drives have col lapsed with increased intrusion of market forces, break down of traditional systems, population explosion, power politics, inappropriate pricing and subsidy. Yet there are some groups that still maintained their sanctity and worth. Few such indigenous people are the ‘Kuna’ of Panama, the ‘Kayapo’ of Brazil and of course the ‘Bishnois’ of India. Bishnois as we know are the world’s first fervent environmentalists that follow it as a religion.
Face to Face
The newly constituted Ministry of Earth Sciences is poised to march ahead in its relentless search for bringing new technology and solutions for the millions that live in India. The editor in conversation with Dr. P. S. Goel, Secretary, MOES, was indeed awed with his vision, drive, dynamism and deep-rooted patriotism among other qualities that makes him what he is today.
