Today, happened to see an article from Vikatan regarding the recently launched Cauvery Calling campaign of Isha Foundation:
https://www.vikatan.com/government-and-politics/environment/will-the-cauvery-calling-result-in-second-green-revolution
Some of the questions appear natural but completely irrelevant and this blog post explains why.
The article starts with facts like 40% reduction in Cauvery water and 87% green cover removed, etc. which are directly taken from Cauvery Calling website and quoting as if it's their own! Is it not obvious from these facts that loss of the green cover has caused reduction in Cauvery water and the solution is making up for the lost green cover?
Anyway, this article from Vikatan seems to be focusing on creating imaginary problems for a solution proposed and not give any solution. Let's look at their complaints one by one.
#1: The trees are non-native and are not really useful for the soil.
The list of trees that Vikatan team has got is the list of all trees from the nurseries. In their own article, at a later point of time, the writer silents adds a sidenote that the Isha team has clearly said that farmers will be given native species trees for timber, fodder & fruits.
In Tamilnadu, the Project Green Hands nurseries currently provide for the general public, flowering and shade-giving trees for planting in home and institutional gardens, roadside, parks and other public spaces.
But Cauvery Calling is focused only on native tree species chosen according to the agro-ecological region, which farmers can plant on their fields and field bunds, which will enrich the soil, increase soil moisture, recharge groundwater and provide the farmer income over the years.
- The list contains all trees because those are all distributed by the nursery for public in general.
- Not all of these are alien species as well.
- Native species plants according to that soil is what are recommended by Cauvery Calling!
What Vikatan conveniently did not publish are the benefits of some of the native trees in that list like:
- Vengai (Pterocarpus marsupium) is especially known for cooling the soil with shade and increasing ground water levels
- Nattuvagai (Indian Siris) has the potential for increasing pastoral production in the wet-dry tropics where the major problem is low feed quality of the basal diet, mature tropical grasses
- Poovarasu (Indian Tulip) is a fast growing tree, and under ideal conditions can be expected to live to a ripe old age of 120 years or more! The bitter inner bark of the Indian Tulip tree is used as diuretic and stimulant along with several other medicinal benefits.
And anyone who has grown a guava tree and pomegranate tree in their own lands know that these are definitely lot more than commercial trees and their ability to enrich the soil is tremendous with leaf fall and organic richness.
#2: Going for commercial trees will not support farming
The whole point of going towards AgroForestry is to get a sufficient density of green cover in several pockets in the Cauvery river basin. The organic content from leaves will definitely increase the richness of soil and also increase the hold of ground water in the area. If this does not enhance the quality of farming, what will?
And if the farmers do not go for commercial trees, how can they see economic viability in moving to AgroForestry or even sustaining themselves with the current archaic methods of Agriculture?
Having a proper density of trees in any region is scientifically proven to increase the water levels in the area.
This is a validated eco-model across the world and is basic science.
How did the Vikatan team not know even this while writing an article about the scientific aspects of Cauvery Calling?
#3: The action plan of Cauvery Calling is not clear
So far, the only actions regarding Cauvery water have been political and not much good has come out of it for both the states. For the first time, something really constructive is happening on the ground and all these people are doing is try to find faults with it!
Cauvery Calling is the action phase of 'Rally For Rivers' (RFR). The policy recommendation document of RFR has been validated by NITI Aayog with several scientific establishments across the country already. In 2017, the RFR policy document has already been shared to the state Governments as an official recommendation by NITI Aayog. So, the overall AgroForestry promotion is already validated.
Just because one does not see it does not mean a clear action plan does not exist. The detailed project reports are given to the state governments. Only after September 15th can we expect to see the detailed action plan. For simple understanding of general public, the idea is explained as AgroForestry.
One simple search on the internet about benefits of AgroForestry can make one understand that it is better for farmers in more ways than one, like:
- Increased revenue from timber and medicinal plants
- Enhances soil richness and groundwater levels
- Makes the crop productivity better by attracting more bird & insect species
There are several things involved in making this Cauvery Calling successful:
(a) Conducting awareness camps to farmers
(b) Training farmers to handle AgroForestry properly
(c) Setting up of nursery infrastructure and provide saplings to farmers as is required for the type of land they have
(d) Continuous support for farmers to manage the trees properly
All these are part of the Cauvery Calling campaign as explained in their website clearly. It may look daunting but if there is one organization that can pull this off, it is the Isha Foundation. The Foundation already has the experience of having 69600+ farmers move into AgroForestry. Their success stories are well documented.
#4: Isha is just selling saplings to make their business
It is not only about selling saplings as is being claimed by some naysayers. That is a very naive way of looking at Cauvery Calling.
As an example, a teak sapling can come around 150 to 200 Rupees in a typical nursery. But all saplings are given at a much cheaper rate for the farmers through Cauvery Calling. How can this be a business if Isha is not even making profit out of it?
Today, perhaps 10% or lesser number of farmers only would want their children to continue Agriculture. If anything, this move towards AgroForestry can encourage more people to move towards Agriculture making it both economically and ecologically viable.
It is not as easy as giving commentary sitting somewhere and talking about Cauvery as just an environmental issue. The volunteers on ground are pouring their sweat and blood daily in reaching out to farmers. Farmers from both Tamilnadu and Karnataka are being consulted and detailed discussions & awareness sessions are happening daily.
So far, over 9,000 farmers have already registered to move towards AgroForestry only because they see multiple benefits in it:
(a) Their soil gets enriched because of the native tree saplings that will be given to them
(b) They need not move away from their regular cropping because the trees will be only a small part of the total land
(c) The ground water levels will definitely increase because of the trees
(d) They can use the timber or fruits from the trees for making more money
(e) They will not need to keep buying more trees from the nurseries because they can reuse seeds from those trees itself
Anybody with basic understanding of farming will know clearly that all these are the major positives for farmers.
#5: Isha is conducting a rally and asking to give missed call again
For the first time, only because someone like Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev is conducting a bike rally all along the Cauvery basin, the whole area will get a coverage in media like never before. It is time for the whole of India and the world to understand what kind of problems our farmers are really facing.
No media has so far covered the travails of farmers along the Cauvery basin or has conducted a proper study of the issues of these farmers. If anything, Vikatan have only themselves to blame for this :)
The number 8000980009 was used for 'Rally For Rivers' campaign in 2017. The RFR campaign lead to the national river policy being shared as official recommendation from central government to all the state governments. That happened only because of the massive public support and solidarity showcased through the missed calls.
The same 8000980009 number is being used for 'Cauvery Calling' because this is just the action phase of RFR. So, anybody calling this number will be prompted for action towards saving river Cauvery now.
Nobody is asking to give any missed call. This is plain misinformation.
#6: This Cauvery Calling will not help revive Cauvery river as such.
How the Cauvery Calling project will revive the river as such is a pertinent question and can be answered very scientifically.
It is well known that trees capture the rain water discharge in their roots and release water slowly letting it percolate into the soil.
Living and decaying roots of trees create a network of well-connected channels in the soil called macro-pores. Water flow through these macro-pores can be up to several hundred times faster than the flow through the soil matrix. Also, organic matter from leaf fall and the tree roots improves soil structure, which can increase infiltration rates of rainwater into the ground.
A River's baseflow results from groundwater seeping into riverbanks or the riverbed. The baseflow is the sole or primary source of streamflow during the annual dry season when rainfall is insufficient to generate substantive runoff.
The surface water is almost always connected to groundwater, which has a critical impact on river water flow. In general, the baseflow can be significant enough to allow the stream to flow around the year. Recharge from groundwater through baseflow is the major source of sustained flow in the river, except during storms.
This is the science behind afforestation along river basin and that is the basis of Cauvery Calling as well.
The Late Nammalvar ayya, one of the most eminent environmental scientists of South India, has spoken about the good work Isha has been doing in this field and about AgroForestry basics.
Also, the Cauvery Calling board is made of eminent scientists, IAS officers, judiciary members and industrialists from across India.
One has to think if and why would such eminent personalities stand up for a social cause if they do not agree with the fundamental scientific principles involved.
Am sure the people whom Vikatan team interviewed are not more qualified than these board members to talk about science or environmental policy.
#7: There are lot of problems in the source itself like occupation by coffee plantations, etc.? What about industrial pollution?
It is not that the Cauvery Calling team is not aware of the other problems in the Cauvery basin area.
One thing is, if we wait for all the problems to be solved before we take a single constructive step forward, we may have to wait for generations. That is impossible in the current situation where farmers are already in distress.
Second thing is, the coffee plantation owners are also being approached for increasing trees in their plantations which will directly address the source problem.
Some people seem to think that the planting is only along the main river of Cauvery. No, the Cauvery basin is over 85000 Sq Km. There are over 120 tributaries to river Cauvery.
The tree plantation has to happen in private lands as well as public lands all over the Cauvery basin.
And not all of this area has industrial pollution problem and that problem has in fact been comprehensively addressed in the Rally For Rivers policy recommendation document itself. The TN state Government has to just act on it.
#8: Will our farmers go away from Agriculture? What will happen if timber industry comes up?
All these are baseless fears and everyone should know the truth about it now. By definition, agroforestry is the growing of a combination of trees and field crops on farmers' fields. The campaign is not by any means promoting growing trees alone.
Another thing many people do not get is we have close to 70% of India as farmers. That means, for every 10 people 7 are farmers but contribution from Agriculture to India's GDP is less than 20% and is only falling!
That means, 30% of India's population is producing over 80% of India's GDP whereas the remaining 70% are just producing the food. This is completely unsustainable.
We have to move towards a model where perhaps 10% to 20% of people are engaged in food production whereas the rest of the population is working towards enhancing the GDP through other sectors. That is a whole different structure altogether and moving towards it will take time like reskilling people, etc. In the mean time, moving towards a supporting model like AgroForestry for farmers is one positive step forward.
What will happen if the timber industry comes up is not even a valid question as the Cauvery Calling campaign has not talked about the industry involvement nor is it promoting only one type of industry.
Will everyone go towards timber producing? This is a completely unfounded fear and has no basis at all. As part of AgroForestry, only a small percentage of the existing farmland is being converted to trees and existing crops production will continue in majority of the land.
AgroForestry is promoted as an option of remuneration for farmers. Today, we are importing several hundred crores worth of timber from foreign countries.
We can finally move away from that dependency and be able to produce our own timber products within the country. This might even cause agriculture to start contributing more to the country's GDP! Is this not a huge positive in itself?
There are some seriously wrong assumptions made by Team Vikatan that I am questioning here:
(1) How can you make a general statement like "economic solutions are only temporary"? What is the basis for such 'yellow journalism' statements?
(2) Why is there a comparison with Green revolution? Green revolution was a scheme brought about by the Government to move towards chemical fertilizers and all major leaders of the country accepted it at that time. That it did not yield positive results in the long term was something not many even foresaw and reported.
Cauvery Calling is a campaign for the farmers by the public and supports Natural Farming more. What is the underlying basis for this comparison other than spreading fear among farmers and general public?
(3) Who are these 'unnamed sources' for Vikatan and 'Lawyer activists' who are providing it false information? Ideally Vikatan should consult field experts in environmental sciences and agriculture like how Isha has done before launching the Cauvery Calling campaign.
It seems like Vikatan is more interested in keeping the problem of Cauvery going, rather than finding a constructive solution.
As indicated in my earlier posts as well, it is customary for magazines like Vikatan to raise something negative whenever Isha Foundation puts forth some positive action for public well-being. This article does not buck that trend.
https://www.vikatan.com/government-and-politics/environment/will-the-cauvery-calling-result-in-second-green-revolution
Some of the questions appear natural but completely irrelevant and this blog post explains why.
The article starts with facts like 40% reduction in Cauvery water and 87% green cover removed, etc. which are directly taken from Cauvery Calling website and quoting as if it's their own! Is it not obvious from these facts that loss of the green cover has caused reduction in Cauvery water and the solution is making up for the lost green cover?
Anyway, this article from Vikatan seems to be focusing on creating imaginary problems for a solution proposed and not give any solution. Let's look at their complaints one by one.
#1: The trees are non-native and are not really useful for the soil.
The list of trees that Vikatan team has got is the list of all trees from the nurseries. In their own article, at a later point of time, the writer silents adds a sidenote that the Isha team has clearly said that farmers will be given native species trees for timber, fodder & fruits.
In Tamilnadu, the Project Green Hands nurseries currently provide for the general public, flowering and shade-giving trees for planting in home and institutional gardens, roadside, parks and other public spaces.
But Cauvery Calling is focused only on native tree species chosen according to the agro-ecological region, which farmers can plant on their fields and field bunds, which will enrich the soil, increase soil moisture, recharge groundwater and provide the farmer income over the years.
- The list contains all trees because those are all distributed by the nursery for public in general.
- Not all of these are alien species as well.
- Native species plants according to that soil is what are recommended by Cauvery Calling!
What Vikatan conveniently did not publish are the benefits of some of the native trees in that list like:
- Vengai (Pterocarpus marsupium) is especially known for cooling the soil with shade and increasing ground water levels
- Nattuvagai (Indian Siris) has the potential for increasing pastoral production in the wet-dry tropics where the major problem is low feed quality of the basal diet, mature tropical grasses
- Poovarasu (Indian Tulip) is a fast growing tree, and under ideal conditions can be expected to live to a ripe old age of 120 years or more! The bitter inner bark of the Indian Tulip tree is used as diuretic and stimulant along with several other medicinal benefits.
And anyone who has grown a guava tree and pomegranate tree in their own lands know that these are definitely lot more than commercial trees and their ability to enrich the soil is tremendous with leaf fall and organic richness.
#2: Going for commercial trees will not support farming
The whole point of going towards AgroForestry is to get a sufficient density of green cover in several pockets in the Cauvery river basin. The organic content from leaves will definitely increase the richness of soil and also increase the hold of ground water in the area. If this does not enhance the quality of farming, what will?
And if the farmers do not go for commercial trees, how can they see economic viability in moving to AgroForestry or even sustaining themselves with the current archaic methods of Agriculture?
Having a proper density of trees in any region is scientifically proven to increase the water levels in the area.
This is a validated eco-model across the world and is basic science.
How did the Vikatan team not know even this while writing an article about the scientific aspects of Cauvery Calling?
#3: The action plan of Cauvery Calling is not clear
So far, the only actions regarding Cauvery water have been political and not much good has come out of it for both the states. For the first time, something really constructive is happening on the ground and all these people are doing is try to find faults with it!
Cauvery Calling is the action phase of 'Rally For Rivers' (RFR). The policy recommendation document of RFR has been validated by NITI Aayog with several scientific establishments across the country already. In 2017, the RFR policy document has already been shared to the state Governments as an official recommendation by NITI Aayog. So, the overall AgroForestry promotion is already validated.
Just because one does not see it does not mean a clear action plan does not exist. The detailed project reports are given to the state governments. Only after September 15th can we expect to see the detailed action plan. For simple understanding of general public, the idea is explained as AgroForestry.
One simple search on the internet about benefits of AgroForestry can make one understand that it is better for farmers in more ways than one, like:
- Increased revenue from timber and medicinal plants
- Enhances soil richness and groundwater levels
- Makes the crop productivity better by attracting more bird & insect species
There are several things involved in making this Cauvery Calling successful:
(a) Conducting awareness camps to farmers
(b) Training farmers to handle AgroForestry properly
(c) Setting up of nursery infrastructure and provide saplings to farmers as is required for the type of land they have
(d) Continuous support for farmers to manage the trees properly
All these are part of the Cauvery Calling campaign as explained in their website clearly. It may look daunting but if there is one organization that can pull this off, it is the Isha Foundation. The Foundation already has the experience of having 69600+ farmers move into AgroForestry. Their success stories are well documented.
#4: Isha is just selling saplings to make their business
It is not only about selling saplings as is being claimed by some naysayers. That is a very naive way of looking at Cauvery Calling.
As an example, a teak sapling can come around 150 to 200 Rupees in a typical nursery. But all saplings are given at a much cheaper rate for the farmers through Cauvery Calling. How can this be a business if Isha is not even making profit out of it?
Today, perhaps 10% or lesser number of farmers only would want their children to continue Agriculture. If anything, this move towards AgroForestry can encourage more people to move towards Agriculture making it both economically and ecologically viable.
It is not as easy as giving commentary sitting somewhere and talking about Cauvery as just an environmental issue. The volunteers on ground are pouring their sweat and blood daily in reaching out to farmers. Farmers from both Tamilnadu and Karnataka are being consulted and detailed discussions & awareness sessions are happening daily.
So far, over 9,000 farmers have already registered to move towards AgroForestry only because they see multiple benefits in it:
(a) Their soil gets enriched because of the native tree saplings that will be given to them
(b) They need not move away from their regular cropping because the trees will be only a small part of the total land
(c) The ground water levels will definitely increase because of the trees
(d) They can use the timber or fruits from the trees for making more money
(e) They will not need to keep buying more trees from the nurseries because they can reuse seeds from those trees itself
Anybody with basic understanding of farming will know clearly that all these are the major positives for farmers.
#5: Isha is conducting a rally and asking to give missed call again
For the first time, only because someone like Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev is conducting a bike rally all along the Cauvery basin, the whole area will get a coverage in media like never before. It is time for the whole of India and the world to understand what kind of problems our farmers are really facing.
No media has so far covered the travails of farmers along the Cauvery basin or has conducted a proper study of the issues of these farmers. If anything, Vikatan have only themselves to blame for this :)
The same 8000980009 number is being used for 'Cauvery Calling' because this is just the action phase of RFR. So, anybody calling this number will be prompted for action towards saving river Cauvery now.
Nobody is asking to give any missed call. This is plain misinformation.
#6: This Cauvery Calling will not help revive Cauvery river as such.
How the Cauvery Calling project will revive the river as such is a pertinent question and can be answered very scientifically.
It is well known that trees capture the rain water discharge in their roots and release water slowly letting it percolate into the soil.
Living and decaying roots of trees create a network of well-connected channels in the soil called macro-pores. Water flow through these macro-pores can be up to several hundred times faster than the flow through the soil matrix. Also, organic matter from leaf fall and the tree roots improves soil structure, which can increase infiltration rates of rainwater into the ground.
The surface water is almost always connected to groundwater, which has a critical impact on river water flow. In general, the baseflow can be significant enough to allow the stream to flow around the year. Recharge from groundwater through baseflow is the major source of sustained flow in the river, except during storms.
This is the science behind afforestation along river basin and that is the basis of Cauvery Calling as well.
The Late Nammalvar ayya, one of the most eminent environmental scientists of South India, has spoken about the good work Isha has been doing in this field and about AgroForestry basics.
Also, the Cauvery Calling board is made of eminent scientists, IAS officers, judiciary members and industrialists from across India.
One has to think if and why would such eminent personalities stand up for a social cause if they do not agree with the fundamental scientific principles involved.
Am sure the people whom Vikatan team interviewed are not more qualified than these board members to talk about science or environmental policy.
#7: There are lot of problems in the source itself like occupation by coffee plantations, etc.? What about industrial pollution?
It is not that the Cauvery Calling team is not aware of the other problems in the Cauvery basin area.
One thing is, if we wait for all the problems to be solved before we take a single constructive step forward, we may have to wait for generations. That is impossible in the current situation where farmers are already in distress.
Second thing is, the coffee plantation owners are also being approached for increasing trees in their plantations which will directly address the source problem.
Some people seem to think that the planting is only along the main river of Cauvery. No, the Cauvery basin is over 85000 Sq Km. There are over 120 tributaries to river Cauvery.
And not all of this area has industrial pollution problem and that problem has in fact been comprehensively addressed in the Rally For Rivers policy recommendation document itself. The TN state Government has to just act on it.
#8: Will our farmers go away from Agriculture? What will happen if timber industry comes up?
All these are baseless fears and everyone should know the truth about it now. By definition, agroforestry is the growing of a combination of trees and field crops on farmers' fields. The campaign is not by any means promoting growing trees alone.
Another thing many people do not get is we have close to 70% of India as farmers. That means, for every 10 people 7 are farmers but contribution from Agriculture to India's GDP is less than 20% and is only falling!
That means, 30% of India's population is producing over 80% of India's GDP whereas the remaining 70% are just producing the food. This is completely unsustainable.
We have to move towards a model where perhaps 10% to 20% of people are engaged in food production whereas the rest of the population is working towards enhancing the GDP through other sectors. That is a whole different structure altogether and moving towards it will take time like reskilling people, etc. In the mean time, moving towards a supporting model like AgroForestry for farmers is one positive step forward.
What will happen if the timber industry comes up is not even a valid question as the Cauvery Calling campaign has not talked about the industry involvement nor is it promoting only one type of industry.
Will everyone go towards timber producing? This is a completely unfounded fear and has no basis at all. As part of AgroForestry, only a small percentage of the existing farmland is being converted to trees and existing crops production will continue in majority of the land.
AgroForestry is promoted as an option of remuneration for farmers. Today, we are importing several hundred crores worth of timber from foreign countries.
We can finally move away from that dependency and be able to produce our own timber products within the country. This might even cause agriculture to start contributing more to the country's GDP! Is this not a huge positive in itself?
There are some seriously wrong assumptions made by Team Vikatan that I am questioning here:
(1) How can you make a general statement like "economic solutions are only temporary"? What is the basis for such 'yellow journalism' statements?
(2) Why is there a comparison with Green revolution? Green revolution was a scheme brought about by the Government to move towards chemical fertilizers and all major leaders of the country accepted it at that time. That it did not yield positive results in the long term was something not many even foresaw and reported.
Cauvery Calling is a campaign for the farmers by the public and supports Natural Farming more. What is the underlying basis for this comparison other than spreading fear among farmers and general public?
(3) Who are these 'unnamed sources' for Vikatan and 'Lawyer activists' who are providing it false information? Ideally Vikatan should consult field experts in environmental sciences and agriculture like how Isha has done before launching the Cauvery Calling campaign.
It seems like Vikatan is more interested in keeping the problem of Cauvery going, rather than finding a constructive solution.
As indicated in my earlier posts as well, it is customary for magazines like Vikatan to raise something negative whenever Isha Foundation puts forth some positive action for public well-being. This article does not buck that trend.
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