Editorial: Drought in the Rainforest

A NASA-led study has revealed that more than 7,00,000 sq km of Amazon rainforest has been hit hard by a mega-drought that began in 2005 and caused widespread damage to the canopy that blankets the dense vegetation. Drought in the rainforest! Climate Change anyone? What has happened in the Amazon rainforest could be a localised cyclical climate-realted blip or part of a larger climate change impact. Either way, it is important enough to have NASA tracking it and keeping the region and world informed. That’s a start. But what about corners as small as Sikkim? Against the 7 crore hectares affected in the Amazon, Sikkim spreads out a mere 7 lakh hectares. It is unlikely that the impact of climate change or droughts or extreme weather conditions here will flash on the monitors of anyone tracking such events. But the signs are there for all to see. The winter, save one recent morning of a thundershower, has been extremely dry this year; so dry in fact that the Rabi crops in fields which depend on winter rains have failed this year. The monsoons, after the Met offices vacillated between normal to low predictions and verdicts, were heavy this year, but still late and many paddy fields suffered this season. For those who see this as a cyclical event, there are other signs like areas in Sikkim which received only snowfall, now also receiving frequent rainfall; glaciers which used to course kilometres into valleys now having retreated as hanging glaciers leaving behind only scree and debris. This last reference was experienced firsthand by mountaineers attempting the Zemu Gap in West Sikkim some years back. Relying on surveyor notes from around 80 years ago, they realised that glaciers across which the pioneers had walked across had now receded, leaving a nearly kilometre deep scar of extremely fragile rocks and unstable blocks which were now impossible to navigate. This has to be a result of climate change. Not that this phenomenon requires any reiteration since the discourse has already moved on to preparedness. To Sikkim’s credit, it has a department dedicated to Climate Change [the Department of Science & Technology now includes for Climate Change in its name]. Unfortunately, while recognition of climate change as a major future challenge has been taken at the policy level, at the executive level, nothing has changed. Sikkim’s understanding of climate change is no better than any person with access of the internet or relevant literature. Worse still, the impact of climate change on Sikkim has neither been studied nor shared. Unless the impact of climate change is explained with ‘local’ references to the stakeholders, the policy directives and preparedness plans will not succeed. Sikkim had commissioned a study of its glaciers, and while some references have been made to the findings, the final report has not been shared in the public domain yet. As everyone knows, the study of glaciers can provide important insights into climate change impact. Sikkim has already committed itself to prepare better for climate change; as already shared, no one else is going to help Sikkim study or prepare. It will have to do so itself, hence the sooner the available data is shared with the stakeholders, the faster will the analysts be able to make sense of it and put things in perspective and the quicker Sikkim can expect to start, well, preparing better for climate change...