MGNREGS could help fight climate change: govt study

A new government study today said that the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) has helped conserve natural resources and is an effective tool to fight climate change at the ground level, reports

Updated on: Apr 30, 2013, 20:35:59 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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A new government study on Tuesday said that the world’s biggest job guarantee programme - Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS)- has helped conserve natural resources and is an effective tool to fight climate change at the ground level.

The study by Indian School of Sciences, Bangalore, based on research in four drought prone states - Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan - shows the UPA government’s programme has resulted in improved ground water levels and improved availability of water for irrigation.

"It is possible to conclude that that MGNREGS works have contributed positively to the ground water level in the study villages, despite continued expansion and extraction of ground water," the report said.

It also added that works such as check dams, percolation tanks and de-silting of water bodies have contributed to an increase in areas irrigated by borewells and open wells, potentially leading to increased and sustained crop yields in most of the villages in the study area.

The survey conducted as part of the study also said the programme has increased drinking water supply in the villages because of increase in number of water bodies developed under the employment programme.

The study also found land development works under the programme has contributed in improving soil fertility in 72% of agriculture areas resulting in some improvement in production. Soil organic matter or carbon content is a very important indicator of soil fertility and land productivity, the report said.

The government’s use of manpower under the programme for afforestation, reforestation and horticulture had a positive impact in 31 of the 40 villages, where the study was done. Its exact impact was not known as trees have not reached their fruit bearing stage.

The study also said that MGNREGS works related to water and land development have been shown in this study to have contributed to generation of environmental benefits such as ground water recharge, increased water availability for irrigation, increased soil fertility, reduction in soil erosion and improved tree cover.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change had said that agriculture would be worst affected by climate change in South Asia, especially India, and had asked countries to adopt policies for climate change mitigation.

The institute suggested that the programme should focus more on protection of natural resources, maintenance of assets created and empower the village bodies - gram sabha - to monitor the works undertaken under the programme. Once that is done, the study said, the programme could protect poor and marginalised from impacts of climate change.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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