The world is moving fast, you need to catch up otherwise you will fall behind and then everything, the present or the future will give you a tough time, although the moment you try to catch up you pose a threat to the environment around you, the demand side has been continuously showing an upward trend, no one has any idea where or when it will end or show a declining trend.
We are way past the trends of planting trees and saying no to plastic to protect our environment from degrading, honestly, the dynamics of the ecosystem have changed so much that any attempt to safeguard the interest of nature, seems like a drop in the ocean but on the other hand all these drops together make an ocean.
We need to understand that one cannot reach to the bottom of this issue if your solution or thinking comes from the knowledge gained by the all-time neglected environmental studies subject that you must have studied in your junior school, if your idea of saving our Nature is planting a tree than I am afraid that will not be enough, sure a tree can be used to provide an aesthetic appearance but they are not efficient enough to absorb all the carbon dioxide that we have producing, the presence of pollutants and PM 2.5 not only affects a human respiratory system it also affects a tree too, the pollutants accumulate on the leaves and block the pores, resulting a damage in the carbon dioxide absorbing capacity of tree so even if you plant new tree, it will not be effective because of the same phenomenon, so not only you have wasted a land, you have also altered the topography of that area, so the better thing would be to remove the pollutants from the air, reduce our emissions and then proceed with afforestation. This can be achieved by some modern-day technologies that need land to operate further leading to deforestation, the focus should be on how to capture the carbon dioxide released by the resulting deforestation but this absolutely in contrast with this year’s World Environment Day theme “Ecosystem Restoration” but we need strong and aggressive efforts to bring down the emissions and curb down the pollution level artificially.
The best time to plant a tree was 25 years ago but then people as in the whole world just entered into a phase where a good lifestyle was much more affordable and many people started living a lavish life as the economy progressed, less did not seem enough, we demanded more and more hence the capitalists produced more and more leading to increased emission levels so we cannot blatantly blame the capitalists, they had to neglect the Nature to cater to the demands of the masses because if they won’t someone else will cater to your needs and put the former out of business.
So this World Environment Day, I request you to make a resolution and start putting limits to your needs, if you demand less then the energy required in the production will also decrease, creating a butterfly effect (fewer emissions).
I am happy to share with you some things that I think are pretty much doable at a personal and an individual level.
- Switch off the electrical appliances as soon as you go out of the room or use energy-efficient appliances.
- Try not to waste food.
- Try to read more, as you have a deeper and better understanding of the issue, you will be able to derive solutions that are much more effective.
- If you are a parent then try to stress on the academic institutions to pay more attention to building a very strong foundation for environment-related subjects.
- If possible keep a track of where your household waste is being dumped, is it a landfill or a waste to energy plant or is it being disposed into a river without treatment, this will make you more aware as a citizen and help motivate you to develop a system that can be useful at the community level.
- Try to follow the concept of ‘less is more, every month decide one activity or commodity that you will try to use less, for example- use one less sheet of paper every month.
So yes we can save the environment, though it demands some sacrifices on your end too, each bit matters a lot. It’s just that your bit should be in the right direction.
So people let’s do our bit together and save the Environment!!
PS: From an Earthling to the Earth, “Happy World Environment Day”. Humanity will heal you.
