Ecological Threat Report 2023

 A recent report by the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP) warns that the number of people living in countries facing severe ecological threats is expected to surge to 2.8 billion by 2050, up from the current 1.8 billion. These alarming findings come as a result of increasing environmental challenges and climate-related events.

Hotspots in Sub-Saharan Africa

The IEP’s Ecological Threat Report 2023 highlights that over half of the countries facing severe threats are located in sub-Saharan Africa. The report assesses global ecological threats, pinpointing countries and regions most susceptible to conflict, civil unrest, and displacement due to environmental degradation.

Scope of the Study

Covering 221 countries and independent territories, the report further delved into 3,594 sub-national areas, encompassing nearly the entire global population. Out of these areas, 66 countries currently confront at least one severe ecological threat.

Rising Concerns

The report reveals that the number of countries grappling with severe ecological threats and limited societal resilience has surged from 27 to 30 in the past year. Sub-Saharan Africa particularly stands out as a region with significantly heightened ecological threats.

Hotspot Nations

Among the 30 countries identified as hotspots for severe ecological threats and low societal resilience, 19 are located in sub-Saharan Africa. Ethiopia, Niger, Somalia, and South Sudan are considered the most vulnerable, with Ethiopia and Niger newly emerging as hotspots. The report also adds Myanmar to the list of countries facing heightened ecological threats.

Regions of Relative Safety

In contrast, Europe and North America remain the only regions where no country currently faces a severe ecological threat, according to the report.

Key Threat Categories

The report categorizes ecological threats into four main areas: food insecurity, natural disasters, demographic pressure, and water risk. Currently, 42 countries are experiencing severe food insecurity, affecting nearly four billion people, primarily in sub-Saharan Africa.

Water Risk and Conflict

Water risk emerges as a significant global ecological threat, with two billion people lacking access to safe drinking water. While sub-Saharan Africa faces the highest water risk, the Middle East, North Africa, Russia, and Eurasia are also witnessing increasing challenges in this regard. The report highlights that a 25% increase in food insecurity, lack of access to clean drinking water, or natural disasters raises the risk of conflict by 36%, 18%, and 21%, respectively.

Call for Action

The report underscores the urgency for world leaders to take action, invest in resilience-building, and address ecological threats, especially as the 28th Conference of Parties (COP28) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change approaches. Steve Killelea, founder and executive chairman of IEP, emphasizes the need for proactive measures to combat these threats and support affected communities.

Investment for Resilience

The report underscores the need for substantial investment to enhance resilience against ecological threats, reducing the risk of conflict and forced migration. It also outlines various policy recommendations aimed at assisting local communities in improving water resources, agricultural yields, and overall resilience.

The ecological concerns around river-linking projects

 The controversy over the river-linking project is not new; it’s a part of a larger development versus ecology debate that India faces with every big project. But in an era of climate crisis, which has a multi-sectoral impact, addressing ecological concerns is crucial and ensure long-term safety and benefits.

This week, the Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh governments signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) to start work on the country’s first major project interlinking two rain-fed rivers, Ken and Betwa. The agreement was signed 18 years after the project was first conceived as a part of country’s programme to interlink rivers to provide water to areas facing scarcity. The project is expected to ensure drinking water to 6.2 million people and irrigate one million hectares of land in 13 districts across both states, the majority of which fall in the water-starved Bundelkhand region, which has seen back-to-back droughts in the last decade.

Experts have flagged two concerns. First, project proponents fail to take into account the fact that the water crisis is not just a natural one; it’s partly man-made. The region’s granite topography does not allow rainwater to seep in and recharge the groundwater table, but this problem has been aggravated by policies that support faulty cropping patterns, encourage groundwater exploitation, degrade the soil and hack away at forest cover. Second, the project may submerge 6,107 hectares of the old and biodiverse forests of the Panna Tiger Reserve and Ken Ghariyal Sanctuary. This can impact water availability, rainfall patterns and destroy local ecosystems. Instead, the government could have pushed for low-cost, local interventions such as renovating and building water harvesting systems, desilting reservoirs and lakes and working towards a change in cropping patterns.

The controversy over the river-linking project is not new; it’s a part of a larger development versus ecology debate that India faces with every big project. But in an era of climate crisis, which has a multi-sectoral impact, addressing ecological concerns is crucial and ensure long-term safety and benefits.

Source: Hindustan Times, 25/03/21

Decoding patterns of lion, tiger and leopard attacks on humans

Lion attacks led to more human fatalities than by other species, says study

A recent study published in the Journal of Applied Ecology reveals that lion attacks led to more human fatalities, persisted for a longer time and extended over larger areas than tiger or leopard attacks.

The study analysed 908 attacks on humans by these species in India, Nepal, and Tanzania. Researchers said very little is known about the pattern of such attacks and studies like these provide a range of perspectives.

Time and space

“We have attempted to understand the spread of these attacks in terms of time and space. Each spread was different. For example, leopard attacks in Maharashtra occurred in agricultural villages, while those in Himachal Pradesh were frequent in rain-fed croplands,” said Vidya Athreya, a research associate at the Wildlife Conservation Society and one of the authors of the study.

The study also revealed that lion and tiger attacks were disproportionately located in residential woodlands habitat with 10–100 people per sq km, and lions also attacked more people in areas with recent loss of tree cover.

Titled ‘Species-specific spatiotemporal patterns of leopard, lion and tiger attacks on humans’, the study was initiated by lion expert Craig Packer and ecologist Nicholas M. Fountain-Jones. It analysed 319 lion attacks in southern Tanzania between 1989 and 2008 that were spread over an area of 42,500 sq km; 67 leopard attacks between 1993 and 2003 in Maharashtra spread over an area of 4,100 sq km and 329 leopard attacks between 2004 and 2014 in Himachal Pradesh spread over an area of 19,100 sq km.

‘Warning people’

The tiger attacks were studied in India and Nepal — 94 attacks over an area of 2,400 sq km in Maharashtra between 2005 and 2010; and 88 in 2,300 sq km around the Chitwan National Park in Nepal between 1979 and 2006.

“Our analysis reveals the typical spatiotemporal patterns of past lion, leopard, and tiger attacks on humans. In future, this technique could be used by relevant agencies to warn local people of risks from further attacks within a certain time and distance following an initial incident by each species,” the study stated, adding that the approach can also help identify areas requiring management interventions to address such threats.

According to researcher Shweta Shivakumar, who covered the Himachal Pradesh aspect of the study, the data on the attacks were obtained from the forest department. “We further interviewed the people and also visited the spot of the attack,” said Ms. Shivakumar, adding that a space-time scan was carried out by feeding GPS location, date, time and other details of the attacks.

“The findings could provide valuable information to agencies for concentrated conservation efforts in future,” she said.

Source: The Hindu, 17/01/2019

What is polygyny threshold model in ecology?

This refers to the hypothesis that the practice of polygyny, where multiple females choose to mate with a single male, is the result of the desire to achieve access to resources held by dominant males. Accordingly, societies in which resources are concentrated in the hands of a few males should witness more polygyny. The hypothesis was first proposed by American ecologist Gordon H. Orians in his 1969 paper “On the evolution of mating systems in birds and mammals”. The model has also been used to explain the prevalence of polyandry in certain societies where resources needed for male survival are under the control of dominant females.

Source: The Hindu, 4/12/2018

What is Gause’s Law in Ecology?

lso known as the competitive exclusion principle, this refers to the proposition that the populations of two competing species cannot remain at stable levels over time. When two species compete for control over a limited amount of resources, the dominant species will take advantage over its weak competitor. This will cause the weaker species to get excluded from its previous territory and its population to drop over time. The law is named after Soviet biologist Georgii Gause although it was formulated first by American biologist Joseph Grinnell in his 1904 paper “The Origin and Distribution of the Chestnut-Backed Chickadee”.

The Hindu, 21/11/2018

Protect the little helpers

Hundreds of species of pollinators may be in dangerous decline

Across India’s agrarian plains, plantations and orchards, millions of birds, bats and insects toil to pollinate crops. However, many of these thousands of species may be in dangerous decline.

ALSO READ

Decline of pollinators threatens food supply

KAMAL BAWA

 

In 2015, the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) found that pollinators lead to huge agricultural economic gains. The report estimated pollinator contribution in India to be $0.831-1.5 billion annually for just six vegetable crops. This is an underestimation considering that nearly 70% of tropical crop species are dependent on pollinators for optimal yields.

The decline of moths, bees, butterflies, hoverflies and other pollinators is undeniably linked to human activity: large tracts of natural habitats have been cleared for monoculture cultivation, while the use of pesticides and fertilisers is pushing out nature’s little helpers. In a series of studies at the University of Calcutta, researchers have showed that native Indian bees, when exposed to multiple pesticides, suffer from memory and olfactory impairment, lower response rates, and oxidative stress which damages cells. Parthiba Basu and his team estimated that between 1964 and 2008, there was a 40-60% growth in relative yields of pollinator-dependent crops, while pollinator-independent crops such as cereals and potatoes saw a corresponding 140% rise in yields. In Kashmir, researchers have pinned lowering yields of apple trees on the declining frequency of bee visits. In north India, lowering yields of mustard cultivation may be caused by disappearing pollinators.

At the turn of the millennium, many countries, particularly the U.S., observed with some anxiety the phenomenon of bees deserting their hives. By 2014-15, the U.S. had established a Pollinator Health Task Force and a national strategy that focussed on increasing the monarch butterfly population and planting native species and flowers in more than 28,000 sq km to attract pollinators. Around the same time, the U.K. developed 23 key policy actions under its National Pollinator Strategy. Meanwhile, after the IPBES report, almost 20 countries have joined the Coalition of the Willing on Pollinators.

Apart from promoting organic farming and lowering pesticide usage, landscape management is key. The EU Pollinators’ Initiative adopted in June can provide pointers to India, particularly a policy of direct payment support to farmers to provide buffer strips for pollinators for nectar- and pollen-rich plants. India has millions of hectares of reserve forests, some of which have been converted to pulpwood plantations. Much of this can be restored to become thriving homes for pollinators. The same can be done in gram panchayat levels. Fallow areas and government land can be used to plant flowering species for pollinators.

The writer is a Principal Correspondent at The Hindu’s Bengaluru bureau

Source: The Hindu, 12/11/2018

What is ecological succession in ecology?

This refers to the progressive changes that happen to the biological structure of an ecological community. Over time, there are changes that take place in the composition of species that constitute an ecological community. In the case of primary succession, a region that is uninhabited by any species gets occupied by a few species over a period of time. In other cases, a preexisting group of species is replaced by a new group of species, a process called secondary succession. As a general rule, it is believed that ecological communities move from possessing very little species diversity to a more stable state where they house an array of species.

Source: The Hindu, 26/09/2018