The Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago (EPIC) has released its annual Air Quality Life Index 2024 report. The report reveals that people in the most polluted regions on Earth are breathing air six times more polluted than the least polluted areas, reducing life expectancy by about 2.7 years in these regions. There is ..read more

Shubhash Chandra Bose from Latehar, Pinki from Saraikala and Chandradeo Ghami from Bokaro districts in Jharkhand, recently realised that they have a lot in common. Their villages have been struggling with rather similar issues – changing rainfall patterns, declining production in agriculture, increased use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides, land degradation, changes in quantity and ..read more

In 2020, when the world was struggling with the coronavirus disease pandemic (COVID-19) and businesses were closing, Binod Kumar Mahto, who had been associated with the marketing department of a bank in Pune for a decade, decided to return to his village in the Hazaribagh district of Jharkhand. The first challenge after returning was to ..read more

This week’s environment and conservation news stories rolled into one. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to watch the latest high quality, original video stories from nature’s frontline in India. To receive a weekly email roundup of stories, please sign-up for our newsletter. New urban governance bill in Bengaluru faces criticism, takes away citizen power says ..read more

Purabi Saikia, an associate professor with the Department of Botany at Banaras Hindu University, is one of 18 scientists to win the Vigyan Yuva-Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar – a government honour recognising young scientists under the age of 45 who have made “exceptional contributions” to their field of study. A total of 33 scientists were awarded ..read more

The forest officials of Uttar Pradesh’s Bahraich district breathed a sigh of relief when they captured five wolves from a pack of six, which has been under scrutiny for recent animal attacks on people, mostly children. “The good news is that there haven’t been any attacks reported in the past week,” Shaheer Khan, a conservation ..read more

Foraging for food is an activity that isn’t limited to rural spaces. In fact, urban foraging plays a crucial role in aiding food security for underserved communities. It is generally performed by middle-aged or older women who stroll around their neighbourhoods and other areas like lakes, roadsides and parks in search of food plants that ..read more

New research from the University of Oxford and the University of Exeter examines savanna biome distribution and drivers through the lens of tree cover across India. Using remote sensing (the process of monitoring the physical characteristics of an area by measuring its radiation, typically from a satellite), the study analyses tree cover across forests and ..read more

Check dams are small, often temporary structures built across rivers and water channels to conserve water and recharge groundwater levels. In Kerala’s Kasaragod, check dams have been traditionally crafted with minimal, low-cost materials for centuries. Locally called katta, these small dams provide a steady source of water for irrigation, improving agricultural productivity. The kattas of ..read more

A new study offers glimpses into the habitat preferences, activity patterns and threats faced by the small cat population in the Mehao Wildlife Sanctuary (WLS) in Arunachal Pradesh using camera traps. These small cats were documented via camera traps for the first time in the sanctuary, in the Lower Dibang Valley of Arunachal Pradesh, as ..read more