Overview into our politicians. drought-prone conditions across large areas What we, therefore, see is absolute may- of the country. But in these conditions we hem in the years to come. What took the West have seen some outstanding community- one generation to control could take our based responses to reverse the land degrada- already heavily polluted India as much as two tion and thus revive the local biomass-based to three generations to control, in other economy. Two villages – Sukhomajri, situated words, some 40-50 years. The future is, in the sub-Himalayan Sivalik hill range, and therefore, nothing less than frightening. Ralegan Siddhi, situated in the drought-prone Deccan plateau region of Maharashtra – start- …but there is a glimmer of hope in rural ed their efforts in the 1970s. Tarun Bharat India Sangh, a non-governmental organisation, began encouraging village communities liv- But just as I am pessimistic about the urban ing in the Aravalli ranges of Alwar district of sector I am increasingly more and more opti- Rajasthan in the mid-1980s to revive their tra- mistic about the possibility of change in rural ditional water harvesting system called johads India. In the 1980s and 1990s we have seen and is today working with nearly 500 villages outstanding work to promote community in the area. Inspired by the outstanding based natural resource management in many transformation of Ralegan Siddhi, Digvijay villages and if we can ensure that these efforts Singh, the chief minister of Madhya Pradesh, are replicated on a large scale then a large modelled a state-wide community-based part of India’s rural poverty can be wiped out watershed development programme which in the coming years. Rural Indians live on, in four years, by 1998, had reached nearly what I call, a biomass-based subsistence 8000 villages. economy. Food, fuel, fodder and feed for their In all these transformations, development animals, building materials like thatch and of transparent and participatory community- timber, and medicinal herbs, all come from based decision-making institutions and estab- plants and animals found or grown in their lishment of community property rights over immediate environment. Water, too, comes the local natural resource base was critical. from the immediate environment and plays a These institutions decided natural resource key role in determining the productivity of the management priorities, resolved conflicts available lands. Environmental degradation, within the communities, and determined bur- therefore, takes a very heavy toll on the local den- and benefit-sharing rules. Techno- subsistence economy and the daily lives of logically, the starting point was rainwater the rural people, resulting in acute poverty, harvesting – centuries-old tradition of Indian hunger and distress migration, especially of villages – which slowly led to the regenera- males. This is ecological poverty, different tion of the entire ‘village ecosystem’ and the from the cash economy, our economists love associated rural economy. Indian villages sit- to count. uated in semi-arid to sub-humid environ- During the last 25 years, land degradation ments (500 mm to 1200 mm rainfall) tradi- in India has resulted in increased poverty and tionally worked within an agrosylvopastoral Director’s Report 1997-99 5 vertical and a lateral structure. This is important for us in order to optimise our Staff and activities: Increase in the number of activities and resources so that staff can contribute to products (1995 to 1999) different activities. Currently, the Centre has a fairly structured organisational structure but 30 one that promotes programme coordination between different programme units. The organisational framework for 25 programmes is based on distinct cells and units/teams. Cells demarcate the overall programmatic theme and the direction of 20 work. A Team/Unit is a cohesive group of staff working within a cell. This structure allows for a flexible organisational structure that can 15 meet the requirements of the Centre’s programme. But the disadvantage of cells is that they can easily become too compartmen- 10 talised and inward looking. There is the danger of overstaffing as each cell will try to get all the skills it needs within 5 itself rather than sharing skills and human resources with others. But we are trying to overcome these problems by instituting 0 various institutional mechanisms: 1994-95 1995-96 1996-97 1997-98 1998-99 G Interlinking through LAN covers all No. of staff No. of products No. of activities staff members and enables them to com- municate more with other members. Note: The baseline for number of staff has been taken as 70. (70 =1) G A system whereby all major campaigns, conferences and other programmes are opportunities for all staff to come together b. Building a deadline culture and share responsibilities. Our past experience in CSE was that research G A formal work commitment in the annual had no deadline. The best of schedules could plans whereby each staff member has be modified as there was always something responsibilities to contribute to the work more that was needed to be done. And most of other teams. For instance, every staff reports remained manuscripts in drafts. The member has a responsibility to contribute deadline was always director-driven. to Down To Earth, to the State of India’s Therefore, we wanted to organise work that Environment Reports, State of Global was driven by the individual, and was organ- Environmental Negotiations Report and to ised in a way that the product was determined the website. The Gobar Times and and the output assured. This was in fact a key the documentary films teams also use on reason why we collaborated on starting the the research material produced by the fortnightly Down To Earth. The magazine pro- programme teams of the Centre. vides us with an inbuilt programme monitor- In 1995, we began to restructure the ing mechanism – to ensure that the internal existing teams to enable the Centre to move research is deadline driven. into new programme areas — to move away from a single focus on journalism to other foci c. Annual programme planning on policy research, studies, campaigns and Although the Centre has been doing annual education. planning exercises for several years now, we We developed teams to do more than have now set up a system that makes it journalism. But we did this not so much by detailed, rigorous and structured. Every pro- adding new staff but by internal restructuring gramme unit in the Centre participates in this to form specialised research and advocacy exercise. The exercise provides the Centre’s teams. The staff who have formed specialised programme staff with an exposure to manage- teams are doing far more rigorous research ment issues like budgeting, staff planning, fund and their advocacy work demands from them raising, project development, commitments to more varied skills of communication and other groups in CSE and time management. networking. As part of their efforts to build a The annual planning exercise ensures constituency and influence they publish that every staff member plans his/her work articles. output in advance and thereafter is responsible An important indicator of our reengineer- for the outputs. The system of clear deadlines ing efforts is our staff strength. From 1995 till and monthly monitoring of those deadlines date it has remained more or less ensures that programmes are kept on track. constant – from 85 in 1995 to 94 in 1999. But The annual reviews also help to identify over- in these years, the number of activities and all weaknesses — in staff members, in the publications has risen considerably. planning process, in the monitoring process. Director’s Report 1997-99 9 branch, organised a national conference on respiratory diseases and air pollution disorders Model minister in New Delhi on September 28, 1997. Realising the importance of such a forum, A politician with a difference which for the first time was designed to sensi- tise doctors in the capital to health risks from At the same public meeting on November 1, air pollution, CSE supported the initiative and 1997, CSE had revealed that the death rate participated in the meeting. Apart from outlin- due to air pollution had doubled in Calcutta ing the problem of vehicular pollution and between 1991-92 and 1995. Shocked by this resultant health risks, it stressed the urgency of information, Manabendra Mukherjee, West generating more information on health effects Bengal’s Minister for Environment, Tourism of air pollution and the need for more active and Youth Services contacted CSE to discuss involvement of the medical community with the air pollution problem in Calcutta. He this issue. sought CSE’s help to devise a policy frame- work for countering the problem in Calcutta. November 1, 1997 On November 1, 1997, exactly a year after the release of the report Slow Murder, the Centre certain key pollutants. organised a public meeting titled ‘Slow The same day, a public advertisement — Murder and Since’ to mark the first anniversary Dead by Breathing — was issued by CSE in of its launch in 1996. The meeting was organ- The Times of India, apprising people about ised to draw attention to the perilous deterio- CSE’s alarming findings. The advertisement ration in urban air quality. In a crowded audi- had one terse and caustic message: “While torium, Anil Agarwal reviewed what the gov- you are forced to line up to get your vehicle’s ernment had done over the past year to control tailpipe tested, the real culprits go scot-free.” vehicular pollution, and pointed out how The advertisement clearly listed the culprits — inadequate and cosmetic the official efforts the regulatory bodies and the automobile had been. “We don’t have our own method of industry — who are responsible for transform- monitoring pollution levels and the present sit- ing our cities into gas chambers.