Climate change, climate justice, and the need for resilience

I remember when the onslaught of globalization hit Auroville: I was living in Pitchandikulam, and Joss (though I doubt if he still remembers this), disgusted by the fact that one could choose between six varieties of toothbrushes at Pour Tous (there was only store in Kuyilapalayam back then), said that he will put out some neem twigs for free distribution among the toothbrushes.

Even though the philosophy of Integral Yoga with its focus on individual freedom does not espouse this, voluntary simplicity is an ethos that I and many Aurovilians subscribe to. Not out of a moral stance, but simply out of the realization that “no man [woman] is an island.” Evolution is not so much about individual growth, but about individual growth in connection to human society and nature. And, notwithstanding the futuristic promise of the transformation of matter, our integral connection to and dependence on nature, enjoins us to cultivate a lifestyle that is in harmony with the limits and patterns of nature. And after decades of unbridled industrialization and globalized capitalism, humankind is being forced to realise that the price of our economic growth and the plethora of goods that we enjoy is climate change.

It would be too optimistic to say that humankind is coming to terms with the threat of climate change. For the truth is, much to the frustration of climate-change activists and scientists, politicians and mainstream society are still largely indifferent to this single greatest threat that humanity has ever faced: climate change with its attendant loss of life and food insecurity. As the eminent novelist and occasional social commentator, Amitav Ghosh points out:

“There is no threat to any society, anywhere, that is remotely comparable to that of climate change. How can people summon so much indignation on so many matters and yet remain indifferent to a process that threatens their very existence?

Nowhere is the disjunction more confounding than in India, which is likely to be one of the worst-affected countries in the world. Over the last couple of decades, as television has penetrated into once-remote areas, India’s population has become highly politicized. Millions of people regularly take to the streets on account of matters ranging from religious outrage to corruption. Yet climate change does not seem to have sparked mass outrage in the country. This despite the fact that India has many eminent climate scientists, some fine environmental reporters and several excellent environmental organizations. Nor is ‘denial’ an issue in India as it is in the Anglosphere: the majority of the population is aware that the climate is changing – yet that awareness does not seem to translate into a major political concern. . . . When crops fail the focus is usually on political and human stories, not on changes in climate.”(1)

Auroville, embedded in India embedded in the world, is a microcosm that often mirrors global trends in humanity. The lack of productivity in our farms is often viewed as the failure of individual farmers to manage their farms, when in reality, there is a host of other contributing factors-poor soil, lack of investments, and yes, changing weather patterns.

Cyclone Thane in 2011 resulted in losses for most farms. Last year, the unprecedented rainfall in December destroyed huge swathes of the millet crops: Annapurna estimates that it lost half of its varagu crop and so did Kalpavruksha, a relatively new farm. Currently, we are experiencing an unusual summer monsoon. In the summer, the rain comes in short spells followed by bright intense sunlight. This month, there were days on end when the skies were overcast, as with the winter monsoon. For most of us extra rain and cloudy skies are a welcome break from the unrelenting heat. But, for vegetable farmers, the lack of sunlight has disrupted the rhythms of plant-growth and production. In Buddha Garden, pumpkin seedlings were attacked and destroyed by an infestation of a red bug. Normally, sunlight would have kept this pest in check (the heat would have destroyed the eggs, if not the insect itself), but this season, the duration and intensity of sunlight was simply inadequate. The result: a marked decline in the pumpkin harvest in the coming months.

To mitigate the loss in production and subsequent income loss, Buddha Garden farmers, Priya and Vivek acted quickly and planted rucola and lettuce. These crops, which would have been generally planted later in the year, like cool wet weather and with luck (that is, if the climate does not hold any more nasty surprises) they will thrive and prove the resilience of Buddha Garden as a farm. But ideally, Auroville should be coming to terms with the fact that if we want to secure healthy food for the community and others in the bioregion, we should be looking at promoting resilience in various ways, such as increasing crop diversity, increasing cultivation area by creating vegetable gardens in all communities of Auroville, and learning how to create compost and best utilize our biomass and to change our food-habits.

The crop losses that our farmers are facing highlight another issue related to climate change: the need for climate justice. The recent Paris conference on climate change brought, for the first time, the concept of climate justice to international political attention. Climate justice simply means that vulnerable communities and nations that will be hit hardest by climate change are generally the least responsible for causing it and have the least capacity to adapt and so should be compensated for this. Bringing this concept of climate justice home to Auroville would mean ensuring that the burden of crop losses due to changes in weather should not be faced by our farmers alone: Food is a basic human need, and food security should be a community responsibility. What we need is a paradigm-shift that would forge closer relationships between farmers and community members, so that the latter actually understand and help mitigate the problems faced by the farmers.

Annapurna has taken a small step in this direction by starting a Support Group of Aurovilian volunteers. It hopes to expand the group in the coming months and create opportunities for community-members to actively help in the farm. Such experiments can easily be replicated in other farms in a far-reaching initiative for community-supported-agriculture.

If there is a silver lining to the problem of climate change, it is this, “There is no such thing as a problem without a gift . . . in its hands,”(2) and the gift of this global problem of climate change is that it calls for an unprecedented unified action by all nations and peoples. Even though most national leaders are dithering in the face of disaster, all over the world thousands of cities and communities are joining hands to mitigate the effects of climate change by creating strong social bonds and resilient communities that can survive in the face of adversity. It is time Auroville joins this growing movement of an actual human unity.

Bindu

(1) Sleepwalking Towards Disaster,” 2015. (http://thewire.in/1363/sleepwalking-towards-disaster/)

(2) Richard Bach. Illusions. Pan Books, 1977