Frenzied growth in real estate and changing lifestyle in Indian cities are inciting resource guzzling. Architects have innovative ideas to build green homes.

As India plays host to the Convention on Biological Diversity's 11th Conference of the Parties in Hyderabad in October 2012, this article takes a closer look at the country's legislation on the subject - the Biological Diversity Act (2002).

Hyderabad: The Conference of Parties (COP) to the Convention on Bio-diversity will be held in Hyderabad from October 1 to 19 to deliberate on issues concerning conservation and sustainable use of b

Carbon offsetting is a fraught science, but there are schemes that have additional benefits beyond their carbon-mitigation value.

The Eastern Himalayan belt is the centre of origin for a number of crops, including rice. This study explored the customary laws and farming practices of Lepcha and Limbu communities, and what they mean for the design of mechanisms to protect traditional knowledge (TK) at national and community levels.

It's a season that inspires and engages everyone, from the farmer to the policy maker. From the scientist to the travel writer. From the economist to the music critic, and from the botanist to the epicure. In a year in which the monsoon has played truant, Down To Earth invited a cross section of writers to unravel its myriad aspects

for full text: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/capturing-monsoons

Kolkata-based architect Laurent Fournier tells how ceilings can float and why bamboo-reed-mud make more sense than brick-concrete-steel.

Analysis of the features attributed to grassroots innovation shows them to be common to all innovations whether in rural, industrializing or industrial locations and does not justify splitting innovation into one with the suffix ‘grassroots’ and another without it as done in India’s current innovation policy. Examples and experience from industrialized countries bring out that innovation policies should adopt an integrated approach for all innovations irrespective of the location or process they emerge from.

A fundamental principle of livelihood is that work has a foundational value. It is opposed to the labour-commodity process where the foundational value of work is thoroughly undermined and where work is disembedded from society and taken out of it. In adivasi livelihoods, work is foundational and only through work does a person know what his or her potentialities are. The current adivasi struggles are at bottom attempts to reclaim this foundational value of work and all that it entails.

The traditional knowledge (TK) of India’s people touches many lives within the country and outside it. For the holders of TK, it is their very lives and thus valuable as is.

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