A World Bank study released on Thursday has found a link between climate change and farmer suicides. It says poor farmers who are unable to adapt to changing climate fall into debt and later, death traps.
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The study found that richer farmers adapted better to the vagaries of climate since they had the resources to diversify and try out other crops that suit the changed climate pattern. "Small farmers fall into a debt trap because of their inability to pay. The situation is worse in villages where private money lenders hold their sway," the report said.
The report is based on pilot studies conducted by The Energy and Research Institute (TERI) in various parts of the country.
After a study of drought-prone villages in Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra, the report said there was a need to shift to less water-intensive crops. In Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh, the experts suggested that long-term micro credit was the only way farmers can escape the debt trap.
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The report pointed out how areas where sugarcane was cultivated extensively had reported a drop in income as they had become arid due to climate change. "There is need to change the crops to mitigate the impact of climate change," it said.
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The report pointed out how areas where sugarcane was cultivated extensively had reported a drop in income as they had become arid due to climate change. "There is need to change the crops to mitigate the impact of climate change," it said.
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Detailed analyses of the impact of climate change in Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Orissa have shown that fall in crop production is directly related to climate change — there has been either a sudden increase in temperature or a sudden burst of shower before the actual monsoons.
In the Pennar basin of Andhra Pradesh, decrease in yield is directly related to increase in temperature. In the Mahanadi basin, the fall is attributed to an increase in rainfall during the monsoons. But in the Godavari basin, the increase in rain had resulted in better crop yield.
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Though the final report will be released next year, some findings were discussed at the European Commission's conference on climate change in Delhi. World Bank's lead environment specialist Bilal H. Rahill sought more money to tackle climate change. Environment secretary Prodipto Ghosh, however, contended that India has done its bit to check climate change.
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.
