The ills and illusions of Industrial development

We have destroyed most of the earth’s forest cover that we had in the 19th century. Whatever is remaining is also under serious threat! Government’s lack of vision, absence of a clear forest policy and implementation are the reasons besides the mistaken view of so called industrial development. The very word development brings to our mind big cities like, New York, London and Paris. In other words high rise buildings, skyscrapers, airports and express highways.

Nobody thinks of a lush green forest for development. Forests are the lungs of the earth. The earth is losing its lungs due to faulty development schemes of the government.

Deforestation is much more rapid and afforestation is not up to the mark in our country. Industrial development is given the top priority and agriculture is looked down upon. Governments acquire arable land to set up industries. The industrial zones are rather death statements. Chukkavanipalem in Srungavarapukota mandal in Vizianagaram district is a living example of the ill industrial development. Once upon a time the village which had 368 families but is now inhabited by fewer than 20 families. The green village with 20 hectares of land now turned into a wasteland. The government has collected 365 acres of land for the setting up of Hindustan Zinc. Though, it was a government organisation at the times of its inception, later on the private share increased. In 2002 Vedanta, took over installed a smelter there to produce and export zinc. It has made good profits year after year but with the lame excuse of scarcity of raw material, power, pollution it has moved the company to Rajastan.

The fact is that Vedanta has bought Gangavaram port for which it needed stock yards. The solution is too simple it has thrown the 300 employees on the road. What remained in the once beautiful village of chukkavanipalem are lung and bone diseases, physically and mentally handicapped people due to the industrial waste and noxious gases released by the factory. The factory is no more. It is the faded dream of development.

Development is not development without greenery. It is simply a euphemism to destruction. Each single human being living on this earth requires 623 sq ft surface area of greenery to produce required daily oxygen. Trees are the longest and largest living things on earth and they live much longer than animals. We can take the Californian Giant Sequoia as an example because it lives for more than 3,000 years. The time taken to cut down this tree is just 3 hours. But it cannot be created again and will have to wait for another 3000 years to get back a tree of the same. So even planting of 300-saplings cannot justify cutting down one single tree. Development should not be limited to industrial development or citification. In the din of development we should not destroy the nature.

Trees are silent and selfless servers that work non-stop 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, without a break. Apart from the cooling effect trees have a very significant impact in reducing smog and overall air pollution. A healthy urban forest can have a strong influence on our region’s water quality. Tree canopies and root systems slow and reduce water runoff reducing potential sources of water pollution into our rivers and storm drains. The tree foliage works as a natural air filter of particulate matter such as dust, micro sized metal and pollutants. Forty trees remove 80 pounds of air pollutants annually.

No denying the fact that the forest cover of the whole world has drastically depleted over a period of time owing to the human needs and activities. For trees planted around a home can save up to 30 per cent on summer cooling costs. We, the inhabitants of earth, have reached the stage where we need to re-design and reconsider our lifestyles for further survival on this planet. If man turns against nature there would be destruction, but if nature turns against man in the form of Tsunamis, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, there would be nothing left except ash.

By: Venkat Poolabala