Researchers including one of Indian origin have unveiled a novel learning platform to improve agricultural resilience to changing weather patterns and to reduce emissions footprint. The data is based much on the knowledge gap between the existing evidence of climate change and adaptation on the ground. 

 

South Asian network to tackle challenge of climate 

India is home to 1.7 million rag pickers, earning $1 to $2 per day searching through the country’s “trash mountains”. Most rag pickers are Muslims from impoverished central Bihar state or illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

Environmental activism reached a different level when close to 200 students of BNM Institute of Technology (BNMIT) pushed their two wheelers backwards to spread awareness about the impact of carbon emissions on the environment on Friday. While some students cycled their way through, most students were earnestly pushing their bikes backward in a pledge to “burn fat and not fuel” to mark World Health Day.

To impress upon people that how the greenhouse gases from petrol-driven vehicles are dragging our environment backward, with the threat of taking it to the point of no return—what with global warming—students of a city college staged a novel demonstration: they pulled motorcycles backwards for a distance of about 2 km on the eve of World Earth Day.

Teachers and students of BNM Institute of Technology (BNMIT) joined hands with an NGO, Centre for Social Markets, to draw attention to the problem.

How many of us (who own two-wheelers) can spend a day without using the vehicle? Bangalore, which has a large population of two-wheelers, is rated as one of the more polluted cities in the country. Students of B.N.M. Institute of Technology and activists from the Centre for Social Markets (CSM) came together on Saturday to create awareness about the effects of global warming and climate change, to mark World Earth Day. Sanctuary Asia and Earth Day Network were also part of the event.

Don’t be surprised if you see motorists pushing vehicles backwards. This Earth Day (April 21), more than 200 students will be pushing their bike backwards for at least two kilometres. According to Professor Shesha Prasad of BNM Institute of Technology, the students would be heading backwards to symbolically show how Bangalore’s weather is heading. More than 200 students of the college have come forward to push their bikes.

The British Minister of State, department of energy and climate change, Mr Gregory Barker, said on Friday that the London Olympics 2012 would be the “greenest Olympics ever. We want to raise the benchmarks for Olympics Games,” Mr Barker said promising to keep the carbon footprint to the minimum. The British Minister was addressing a UK-India partnership programme in Kolkata for developing fiscal instruments for climate friendly industrial development in West Bengal, Odisha and Tamil Nadu.

India’s coastal States should look at offshore wind farms to generate energy. With a coastline of over 7,500 km, India has a natural advantage to go for offshore wind energy, said Mr Swaminathan Krishnamurthy, Associate Director, Climate Change and Sustainable Services, Ernst & Young India.

“Global warming is not some male plot to do women down. The climate is the same for males and females, so far as I know. When it rains we all get wet.” This is how a British Conservative MEP, Marina Yannakoudakis, has responded to a report published by the women’s rights committee, of which she is a member, at the European Parliament.

 

EU climate change ‘worse for women’ claim row 

The west Indian state of Gujarat is flipping the switch on Asia’s largest solar power field as part of its 600 megawatt solar energy addition to India’s power grid. The Gujarat Solar Park, spread across a desolate 3,000-acre (1,200-hectare) swath of desert, can supply 214 megawatts of electricity, making it larger than China’s 200-megawatt Golmud Solar Park.