Today is Earth Day #EarthDay2020. The theme for this Earth Day is “Climate Action” which definitely needs to be addressed right now and that too proactively. It’s been 50 years the we had celebrated Earth Day & 50 years is a long time. Last year we shared an article “Earth Needs An Overhaul” same day today. It seems it was a very appropriate title to make a call for action to Earthlings. Now after this pandemic has struck our beloved earth, we all are learning lessons that we would have learnt before.
The Survival Questions
Where are we headed now, we should really sit and contemplate at the current situation, when the whole world is fighting with #Corona Pandemic at war-footing to save lives. This scenario is really gloomy and is heart wrenching where even the most developed nations are struggling to deal with this disease. The movies which we use to watch about world hit by such disease have almost become a reality. The world stands still amidst lockdown just focusing on saving lives & fighting the virus. The other things are not even on priority list. How did it happen? When will it be over? What went wrong? What does the future hold? Will it happen again? Is the worst still preparing to come? Are we really playing with earth? Don’t we heed the signs at all? Has it been more on paper than action? Where’s that fine line we can’t see? Have we just invited this too soon?
We call Earth “Mother Earth”. It’s so giving. It nurture’s us. It has given us all. But why do all the kids take their mothers for granted? Why can’t they become wise & responsible? Right now it seems either the mother is furious or it’s really sad. For past 50 years, earth days have been celebrated and the planet dwellers have been informed about stark realities in future due to misuse. But where did we all fail?
The Alarming Effects of Climate Change
These similar questions are haunting the minds of everyone and they should even bother you. Why? Because we all are into this together. Our elders and we all are responsible for the results. Overuse of earth, and neglecting the signs to fix it, we have done it all. The effects have been so visible from past few decades and we have read them in course books or elsewhere such as climate change excessive pollution, hole in ozone layer, melting of glaciers, heavy reduction in green cover due to deforestation, natural resource depletion, dwindling flora & fauna population, extinction of species, and several other rare phenomena that suggest we are taking too much from Mother Earth. We try to touch those aspects of earth which we are not supposed to and when we do it creates an imbalance. The climate change that we all are focusing this earth day, has been showing its might last few years where the weather has taken toll on many due to incessant rainfalls leading to destructive floods, less or excessive snowfalls, soaring summer temperatures, droughts, forest fires and more. The climate change has been affecting the populations of species, communities, and functioning of ecosystems. The cause and effects are really disturbing. The potential effects of climate change on forests & the flora and fauna involved are of increasing concern. It’s not that the efforts are not been done, but they are remote & random to fix small ecosystems at different time lines.
We can’t blame the emergence of the MER’s, SAAR’s, COVID-19 directly on climate change. But when we go in depth of species evolution or mutation and the spread of such unknown viruses, we lack lot of information & research. There’s so much still unknown to humans and we never know when we go beyond the realms of Earth. The changes on earth may have indirectly resulted to such appearance of unique identity. There’s so much that we don’t know about the earth, that crossing our limits have resulted in digging our own graves. It also can bring challenging natural calamities in future or wiping out of any species due to emergence of some unknown entity or depletion of a resource totally which is essential for species survival on earth.
Our mindset has been not constructive at all. At ground level most of our thought process is that environmental concerns are not a big issue. We think let the world bodies for environment do what they can, or the government do what they can? How does it even affect us as individuals & what can we do alone? The problem is, the big environmental problems in reality were never addressed collectively, as they were other issues especially humanitarian which seemed more relevant to deal with. We already had alarming situations all over the world, when it came to environmental deterioration but we totally failed in relating environmental concerns with the incoming humanitarian issues. But now the trigger has gone off or it looks like we are all sitting on a time bomb which will again blast in future with an unknown calamity or disease spread. We can’t blame it much to the people which are still living in lap of nature or are preserving their environmental traditions. The developed & developing nations are mainly responsible. The blame totally comes on urban & semi-urban population. Right now staying calm & steady we need to fix what we did wrong. We need to give so much back to earth, and we need to rethink and rejoice in going back to our roots. A collective effort for months or years by all countries & their people, with all of us involved should be done at a massive scale after this corona crisis is over. We should take this as a final warning.”
Earth Gets Respite from Humans
Due to corona spread, for almost a month now we have not been venturing out of our homes during lockdown. Exception & exemptions comes to essential services & people involved in them. As we all those who got a break from their monotonous lives are getting a break, Nature too got a much deserved break. The pollution levels are fairly down & the animals sighting have increased due to less or no intervention of humans even in cities & towns. Take by example in India itself, clear water of Ganges, sighting of dhauladhar range from Jalandhar city, flocking of flamingoes in Mumbai swamps, dolphin sightings near Mumbai beach, day nesting of olive ridleys turtles in Orissa, Civets in Cochin, Peacocks in Mumbai, Nilgai in Noida etc. Internet has been flooded by such similar reports and they have gone viral. With mostly industries shut & vehicles off roads, the all types of pollution has come to all time low.
What we can do?
This tells us a lot. May be earth badly needed a break. Time to resolve the environmental concerns is now or never. Earth really needs a well thought overhaul, which if delayed, the results can be far worst. Let’s start with individual efforts such as living green. Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle. Be judicious with the use of electricity, water & fuel. Take initiative for community cleaning & tree planting campaign and aim for zero waste. Compost food waste & bring garden to your homes both indoors 7 outdoors. Shop from farmer’s markets. Leave your car at home or do carpooling to your work. Volunteer at any environmental organization. Go for eco-friendly gifting or green gifting. Follow these, and sustain mother earth. Else, human future would be a disaster.
This article is by Vandana Chaudhary, Co-Founder of Rolling Nature & Initiative Earth.
Must Read: “Earth Needs An Overhaul” from Archive. Know more why we need to heal the earth.
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