One of the severe problems that the world is facing today is that of environmental pollution, increasing with every passing year and causing huge damage to our mother earth. Environmental pollution has existed for centuries but increased at an alarming rate after industrial revolution in the 19th century. Environmental pollution takes place when nature does not know how to decompose an element that has been brought to it in an unnatural way. The world is exposed to basic types of pollution, namely, air, water, soil, noise and light pollution.
Air pollution is the most harmful form of pollution in our environment and caused by the injurious smoke emitted by cars, buses, trucks, trains, and factories. Even smoke from burning leaves and cigarettes are harmful to the environment. Water pollution is caused due to industrial waste products being released into lakes, rivers, and other water bodies. Humans also pollute water bodies with large scale disposal of garbage and other household waste etc. Noise pollution includes industrial noise, aircraft noise, noise of automobiles, vehicle horns, loudspeakers, loud music etc. Soil pollution, which can also be called soil contamination, is a result of acid rain, polluted water, fertilizers etc., which leads to less quality of crops. Soil contamination occurs when chemicals are released by spill or underground storage tank leakage which releases heavy contaminants into the soil. Light pollution includes light trespass and over-illumination etc.
Effects of Environmental Degradation-
Human health is heavily impacted by environmental pollution. Reduction in air quality is responsible for thousands of deaths annually and millions of chronic diseases. Evidence of increasing air pollution is seen in lung cancer, asthma, allergies, and various breathing problems along with severe and irreparable damage to flora and fauna. The toxic wastes and harmful chemicals from factories, agriculture and automobiles cause illnesses and death in children and adults. Due to environmental degradation, the results also include water scarcity and decline in quality foods. In the developing countries, poverty is attributed to poor crop harvests and lack of quality natural resources that are needed to satisfy basic survival needs. The inadequacy basic survival resources and lack of quality of food is the direct result of environmental degradation in the regions. Environmental degradation alters some of the natural process such as the water cycle and the normal processes of animal and plant activities. Also, environmental degradation aspects such as deforestation and mining destroy the natural land cover. Environmental pollution has caused global warming and climate change which increases the risks of climatic natural disasters, and ozone layer depletion which increases the risk of skin cancer, eye disease, and crop failure etc. Moreover over-exploitation of natural resources, pollution, and deforestation contribute to the scarcity of resources particularly arable land, water, medicinal plants, and food crops etc.
Environmental Protection-
It is now high time to join hands across the globe to protect and preserve our environment and thereby promote human prosperity. Protection of our rich environment is critical to sustainable development. Our development and growth will be short-lived if we do not safeguard the natural environment and its resources.
There are many ways we can help save our beautiful planet. More efficient use of resources is the high need of the time. We must encourage the reduction, recycling and re-use of wastes as raw material for new products. We had a transport business in our family. Every year we had wastage of bus and truck tyres getting heaped up at our home. I remember my beloved mother once covering a small garden with the useless tyres. I was a kid then and never liked the idea and removed the tyres fencing. Now when I joined ITM University Gwalior some years back, I could how better we can use the scrap. It was fancy to watch our students using scrap tyres to make a sitting arrangement out of it. We can promote Jugaad creation to save our resources. The idea was also there with my mother decades back but the proper guidance to make it attractive was missing. What I learnt is that we must promote Jugaad creation, the idea of using the waste and save our vital resources.
Today corporate leaders have joined the race to save the planet. Being environment-friendly, eco-friendly, nature-friendly, and going green are marketing claims referring to goods and services, laws, guidelines and policies that inflict reduced, minimal, or no harm at all, upon ecosystems or the environment. It’s all about taking bold and safer steps towards mother earth so as to make this planet a better place for our communities and generations to come. A good way would be to start with conserving water, driving less and walking more, consuming less energy, buying recycled products, eating locally grown vegetables, joining environmental groups to combat air pollution, creating less waste, planting more trees and many more.
We can simply begin by buying recycled products for your office, home or school. The greater the demand for recycled products, the more companies will be encouraged to add recycled material to their products. And we can begin right at our home places. Let us reuse what we would easily throw away and conserve for a future. What we cannot recycle let us not use them. Buy less disposable products. Buy paper products as they break down better in the environment and don’t deplete the ozone layer as much. We must ban plastic. When we go out for shopping, we must buy products from market that are made up of recycled materials with minimal packaging i.e. the product should be environment friendly. Look into manufacturing processes to check if it was made from recycled materials or the use of plastics or chemicals was involved in its production
Moreover practices such as organic farming, sustainable forestry, natural landscaping etc. are increasingly becoming part of nature and ecology conservation. Preventing and regulating water pollution from industries, municipal sewage treatment facilities, construction sites, farms, and urban areas must receive huge attention. Maintaining, enhancing, and monitoring aquatic based resources such as aquatic ecosystems, sport and commercial fisheries, lakes and wetlands must catch priority treatments. There should be proper management of solid and hazardous waste through storage, treatment and disposal practices. The strong campaign should be moving towards zero waste for an efficient economy and a cleaner environment. We must prevent open burning as backyard trash and leaf burning releases high levels of toxic compounds.
We can use a more fuel- efficient automobile models such as a hybrid or electric. Mexican Ambassador to India is using an auto rickshaw as her official vehicle to be environmental friendly rather than a luxury car. We must use public transit whenever possible. Let us walk more and drive less to conserve fuel and prevent auto-emission. Let’s use bicycles and scooters for shorter distances to save resources. We need to be environmentally friendly citizens. The environmentally friendly person is the person who moves through life with an awareness of how natural resources are used to create and support the life that they live. They recycle, conserve water and fuel and resort to other choices that not only weaken their impact on the environment, but also support industries that are working towards being more environmentally responsible.
Learning to be more environmentally friendly is not that difficult than we think. All we can start small to make the changes more sustainable and a part of our normal life. Plant small trees around your home, don’t cut them unless it’s necessary, work with local environmental groups to plant more trees and educate others about the positive aspects of it. We must educate others about the significance of living an environmentally friendly life. The more people share an awareness of the richness of the environment, the more we can do together to protect it. We may find different environmental groups in our city with whom we can join hands to protect mother earth and make the environment clean. Our educational institutions must promote it high to safeguard the environment through awareness campaigns and implementation programmmes. Isn’t it possible that our schools and colleges and Universities praise students every year as the best ones for the environmental care? This can be a booster to promote wellbeing of an environmental. Finally, let’s teach our children to respect nature and the environment, and learn in the process how we can hold on to the one planet which has a miracle called life. Save the environment. Save Life. It is the call to save our future.
(The author is an Assistant Professor at ITM University Gwalior. His views are personal)