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Subject: Conservation & Mitigation

1. Conservation Progs.
2. Worldwide initiatives
3. Mitigation Strategies
4. Conventions and Protocols

  • [pib] Kovalam & Eden Beaches gets Blue Fag Certification

     

    The international eco-label “Blue Flag”, has accorded the Blue Flag Certification for 2 new beaches this year –Kovalam in Tamil Nadu and Eden in Puducherry beaches.

    With this India now has 10 International Blue Flag beaches.

    Which are the other 8 beaches?

    1. Shivrajpur (Dwarka-Gujarat)
    2. Ghoghla (Diu)
    3. Kasarkod (Karnataka) [NOT Kasargod which is in Kerala] and
    4. Padubidri (Karnataka)
    5. Kappad (Kerala)
    6. Rushikonda (AP)
    7. Golden Beach (Odisha) and
    8. Radhanagar (A&N Islands)

    Blue Flag Beaches

    • The ‘Blue Flag’ beach is an ‘eco-tourism model’ and marks out beaches as providing tourists and beachgoers clean and hygienic bathing water, facilities/amenities, a safe and healthy environment, and sustainable development of the area.
    • The certification is accorded by the Denmark-based Foundation for Environment Education.
    • It started in France in 1985 and has been implemented in Europe since 1987, and in areas outside Europe since 2001 when South Africa joined.
    • It has 33 stringent criteria under four major heads for the beaches, that is, (i) Environmental Education and Information (ii) Bathing Water Quality (iii) Environment Management and Conservation and (iv) Safety and Services.

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  • Species in news: Sea Cucumber

    In a swift operation, the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) at Mandapam, Tamil Nadu seized two tonnes of sea cucumber, a banned marine species.

    Sea Cucumbers

    • Sea cucumbers are part of a larger animal group called echinoderms, which also contains starfish and sea urchins.
    • Their body shape is similar to a cucumber, but they have small tentacle-like tube feet that are used for locomotion and feeding.
    • One way that sea cucumbers can confuse or harm predators is by propelling their own toxic internal organs from their bodies in the direction of an attacker.
    • The organs grow back, and it may save them from being eaten.
    • They are found in virtually all marine environments throughout the world, from shallow to deep-sea environments.
    • They are benthic, meaning they live on the ocean floor. However, their larvae are planktonic, meaning they float in the ocean with the currents.

    Conservation status

    • Sea cucumber in India is treated as an endangered species listed under schedule I of Wildlife Protection Act of 1972.
    • It is primarily smuggled from Tamil Nadu to Sri Lanka in fishing vessels from Ramanathapuram and Tuticorin districts.

    (IUCN status is not available for this species)

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  • How are Humboldts different from other penguins?

    Last week, Mumbai’s Byculla Zoo announced the addition of two new Humboldt penguin chicks this year.

    Humboldt Penguins

    • Humboldt penguins are medium-sized species among at least 17 species.
    • The exact number of distinct species is debated, but it is generally agreed that there are between 17 and 19 species.
    • The largest, the Emperor penguin, stands at over 4 ft tall while the Little penguin has a maximum height of 1 ft. Humboldt penguins have an average height of just over 2 ft.
    • The Humboldt penguin (Spheniscus Humboldt) belongs to a genus that is commonly known as the ‘banded’ group.’

    Relation with the Humboldt Oceanic Current

    • Humboldt penguins are endemic to the Pacific coasts of Chile and Peru.
    • They are so named because their habitat is located near the Humboldt Current, a large oceanic upwelling characterized by cold waters.

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  • Pseudo-melanism in Tigers of Simlipal

    A team of scientists has resolved the genetic mystery of Simlipal’s so-called black tigers.

    What are Black Tigers?

    • Tigers have a distinctive dark stripe pattern on a light background of white or golden.
    • A rare pattern variant, distinguished by stripes that are broadened and fused together, is also observed in both wild and captive populations.
    • This is known as pseudo-melanism, which is different from true melanism, a condition characterized by unusually high deposition of melanin, a dark pigment.
    • This pseudo-melanism is linked to a single mutation in Transmembrane Aminopeptidase Q (Taqpep), a gene responsible for similar traits in other cat species.

    Where are they mostly found?

    • While truly melanistic tigers are yet to be recorded, pseudo-melanistic ones have been camera-trapped repeatedly, and only, in Simlipal, a 2,750-km tiger reserve in Odisha, since 2007.
    • Launched in 2017, the study was the first attempt to investigate the genetic basis for this unusual phenotype (appearance).

    Why they are rare?

    • Mutants are genetic variations which may occur spontaneously, but not frequently, in nature.
    • A cub gets two copies of each gene from both parents, and a recessive gene can show up only in the absence of the dominant one.
    • So, two normal-pattern tigers carrying the recessive pseudo-melanism gene will have to breed together for a one-in-four probability of giving birth to a black cub.
    • But recessive genes are rare and it is unlikely that two unrelated tigers will carry the same one and pass it on together to a cub.

    Connection with Simlipal TR

    • In an ideal tiger world, where far-ranging individuals are never short of choices for partners, that makes succession of black tigers a rarity.
    • Under exceptional circumstances, a black tiger may succeed as part of a very small population that is forced to inbreed in isolation for generations.
    • As it turned out, that is what happened at Simlipal.
    • Pseudo-melanistic tigers are also present in three zoos in India — Nandankanan (Bhubaneswar), Arignar Anna Zoological Park (Chennai) and Bhagwan Birsa Biological Park (Ranchi) — where they were born in captivity.
    • All of them have ancestral links to one individual from Simlipal.

    What about natural selection?

    • Natural selection eliminates the weakest from a gene pool, and the traits of the more successful get passed on.
    • Niche modelling, the study said, shows higher frequency of melanistic leopards in darker tropical and subtropical forests than in drier open habitats.
    • Likewise, darker coats may confer a selective advantage in both hunting and avoiding hunters in Simlipal’s tropical moist deciduous and semi-evergreen closed-canopy forest, with a relatively darker understory.

    Try this PYQ:

    Two important rivers – one with its source in Jharkhand (and known by a different name in Odisha), and another, with its source in Odisha – merge at a place only a short distance from the coast of Bay of Bengal before flowing into the sea. This is an important site of wildlife and biodiversity and a protected area.

     

    Which one of the following could be this?
    (a) Bhitarkanika
    (b) Chandipur-on-sea
    (c) Gopalpur-on-sea
    (d) Simlipal

     

    Post your answers here.[wpdiscuz-feedback id=”plpfw4ge94″ question=”Please leave a feedback on this” opened=”1″][/wpdiscuz-feedback]

    Back2Basics: Project Tiger

    • Project Tiger is a tiger conservation program launched in April 1973 during PM Indira Gandhi’s tenure.
    • In 1970 India had only 1800 tigers and Project Tiger was launched in Jim Corbett National Park.
    • The project is administrated by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA).
    • It aims at ensuring a viable population of Bengal tigers in their natural habitats, protecting them from extinction etc.
    • Under this project the govt. has set up a Tiger Protection Force to combat poachers and funded relocation of villagers to minimize human-tiger conflicts.

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  • Mura-Drava-Danube (MDD) Biosphere Reserve

    UNESCO has designated Mura-Drava-Danube (MDD) as the world’s first ‘five-country biosphere reserve’.

    About Mura-Drava-Danube BR

    • The biosphere reserve covers 700 kilometres of the Mura, Drava and Danube rivers and stretches across Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Hungary and Serbia.
    • The total area of the reserve — a million hectares — in the so-called ‘Amazon of Europe’, makes it the largest riverine protected area on the continent.
    • The reserve is home to floodplain forests, gravel and sand banks, river islands, oxbows and meadows.
    • It is home to continental Europe’s highest density of breeding white-tailed eagle (more than 150 pairs), as well as endangered species such as the little tern, black stork, otters, beavers and sturgeons.
    • It is also an important annual resting and feeding place for more than 250,000 migratory birds, according to WWF.
    • Almost 900,000 people live in the biosphere reserve. (UPSC may ask if it is uninhabited.)

    Significance of this BR

    • The new reserve represented an important contribution to the European Green Deal and contributes to the implementation of the EU Biodiversity Strategy in the Mura-Drava-Danube region.
    • The strategy’s aim is to revitalize 25,000 km of rivers and protect 30 per cent of the European Union’s land area by 2030.
    • The declaration as BR puts river revitalization, sustainable business practices enhancing cross-border cooperation into focus.

    Ignore at your own risk! Its better to correct it here itself.

    Such PYQs are ought to repeat any number of times in UPSC CSE.

    Q. Consider the following statements:

    1. The boundaries of a National Park are defined by legislation.
    2. A Biosphere Reserve is declared to conserve a few specific species of flora and fauna.
    3. In a Wildlife Sanctuary, limited biotic interference is permitted.

    Which of the above statements is/are correct?

    (a) 1 only

    (b) 2 and 3 only

    (c) 1 and 3 only

    (d) 1, 2 and 3

     

    [wpdiscuz-feedback id=”crefywlmtc” question=”Please leave a feedback on this” opened=”1″]Post your answers here.[/wpdiscuz-feedback]

    Back2Basics: UNESCO Biosphere Reserves

    • Biosphere reserves are ‘learning places for sustainable development’.
    • They are nominated by national governments and remain under the sovereign jurisdiction of the states where they are located.
    • They are designated under the intergovernmental MAB Programme by the Director-General of UNESCO following the decisions of the MAB International Coordinating Council (MAB ICC).
    • Their status is internationally recognized. Member States can submit sites through the designation process.
    • Biosphere reserves include terrestrial, marine and coastal ecosystems.

    They integrate three main “functions”:

    1. Conservation of biodiversity and cultural diversity
    2. Economic development that is socio-culturally and environmentally sustainable
    3. Logistic support, underpinning development through research, monitoring, education and training

    (a) Core Areas

    It comprises a strictly protected zone that contributes to the conservation of landscapes, ecosystems, species and genetic variation

    (b) Buffer Zones

    It surrounds or adjoins the core area(s), and is used for activities compatible with sound ecological practices that can reinforce scientific research, monitoring, training and education.

    (c) Transition Area

    The transition area is where communities foster socio-culturally and ecologically sustainable economic and human activities.

    UNESCO recognized BRs in India

    Year of

    recognition

    Name

    States
    2000 Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve Tamil Nadu
    2001 Gulf of Mannar Biosphere Reserve Tamil Nadu
    2001 Sundarbans Biosphere Reserve West Bengal
    2004 Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve Uttarakhand
    2009 Pachmarhi Biosphere Reserve Madhya Pradesh
    2009 Nokrek Biosphere Reserve Meghalaya
    2009 Simlipal Biosphere Reserve Odisha
    2012 Achanakmar-Amarkantak Biosphere Reserve Chhattisgarh
    2013 Great Nicobar Biosphere Reserve Great Nicobar
    2016 Agasthyamala Biosphere Reserve Kerala and Tamil Nadu
    2018 Kanchenjunga Biosphere Reserve Part of North and West Sikkim districts
    2020 Panna Biosphere Reserve Madhya Pradesh

     

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  • Tarballs on Mumbai Coast

    A beach in South Mumbai, saw black oil-emanating balls lying on the shore.

    What are Tarballs?

    • Tarballs are dark-coloured, sticky balls of oil that form when crude oil floats on the ocean surface.
    • Tarballs are formed by weathering of crude oil in marine environments.
    • They are transported from the open sea to the shores by sea currents and waves.
    • Tarballs are usually coin-sized and are found strewn on the beaches. Some of the balls are as big as a basketball while others are smaller globules.
    • However, over the years, they have become as big as basketballs and can weigh as much as 6-7 kgs.

    How are tarballs formed?

    • Wind and waves tear the oil slick into smaller patches that are scattered over a much wider area.
    • Various physical, chemical and biological processes (weathering) change the appearance of the oil.

    Why are tarballs found on the beaches during the monsoon?

    • It is suspected that the oil comes from the large cargo ships in the deep sea and gets pushed to the shore as tarballs during monsoon due to wind speed and direction.
    • All the oil spilt in the Arabian sea eventually gets deposited on the western coast in the form of tarballs in the monsoon season when wind speed and circulation pattern favour transportation of these tarballs.

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  • Places in news: Pilibhit Tiger Reserve

    A herd of around 25 elephants from Nepal’s Shuklaphanta National Park reached the tiger reserve in Uttar Pradesh almost a month back.

    Pilibhit Tiger Reserve

    • Pilibhit Tiger Reserve is located in Pilibhit district of Uttar Pradesh and was notified as a tiger reserve in 2014.
    • It is one of the few well-forested districts in Uttar Pradesh.
    • It forms part of the Terai Arc Landscape in the upper Gangetic Plain along the India-Nepal border.
    • The habitat is characterized by sal forests, tall grasslands and swamp maintained by periodic flooding from rivers.
    • The Sharda Sagar Dam extending up to a length of 22 km is on the boundary of the reserve.
    • The tiger reserve got the first international award TX2 for doubling the tiger population in a stipulated time.

    Try answering this PYQ:

    Q.Consider the following protected areas:

    1. Bandipur
    2. Bhitarkanika
    3. Manas
    4. Sunderbans

    Which of the above are declared Tiger Reserves?

    (a) 1 and 2 only

    (b) 1, 3 and 4 only

    (c) 2, 3 and 4 only

    (d) 1, 2, 3 and 4

     

    [wpdiscuz-feedback id=”kaucolpxf4″ question=”Please leave a feedback on this” opened=”1″]Post your answers here.[/wpdiscuz-feedback]

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  • First Dugong Conservation Reserve to be built in India

    India’s first Dugong conservation reserve will be built in Tamil Nadu for the conservation of Dugong, a marine mammal.

    Try answering this PYQ:

    With reference to ‘dugong’, a mammal found in India, which of the following statements is/are correct?

    1. It is a herbivorous marine animal.
    2. It is found along the entire coast of India.
    3. It is given legal protection under Schedule I of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1974.

    Select the correct answer using the code given below:

    (a) 1 and 2 only

    (b) 2 only

    (c) 1 and 3 only

    (d) 3 only

     

    [wpdiscuz-feedback id=”t05z00rd4i” question=”Please leave a feedback on this” opened=”1″]Post your answers here.[/wpdiscuz-feedback]

    Dugong Conservation Reserve

    • The reserve will spread over an area of 500 km in Palk Bay on the southeast coast of Tamil Nadu.
    • Palk Bay is a semi-enclosed shallow water body with a water depth maximum of 13 meters.
    • Located between India and Sri Lanka along the Tamil Nadu coast, the dugong is a flagship species in the region.

    Dugong: The sea cow

    • Dugong or the sea cow is the State animal of Andaman & Nicobar Islands.
    • This endangered marine species survive on seagrass and other aquatic vegetation found in the area.
    • It is the only herbivorous mammal that is strictly marine and is the only extant species in the family Dugongidae.
    • Dugongs are usually about three-meter long and weigh about 400 kg.
    • Dugongs have an expanded head and trunk-like upper lip.
    • Elephants are considered to be their closest relatives. However, unlike dolphins and other cetaceans, sea cows have two nostrils and no dorsal fin.

    Their habitat

    • Distributed in shallow tropical waters in the Indo-Pacific region, in India, they are found in the Gulf of Kutch, Gulf of Mannar, Palk Bay, and Andaman & Nicobar Islands.
    • Dugongs are long-living animals, that have a low reproductive rate, long generation time, and high investment in each offspring.
    • The female dugongs do not bear their first calf until they are at least 10 and up to 17 years old.
    • A dugong population is unlikely to increase more than 5% per year. They take a long time to recover due to the slow breeding rate.

    Causes of extinction

    • Having being declared vulnerable, the marine animal calls for conserving efforts.
    • Studies have suggested the reasons for the extinction of the animal such as slow breeding rate, fishing, and the loss of habitat.
    • They are also known to suffer due to accidental entanglement and drowning in gill-nets.

    Conservation in India

    • The conservation reserve can promote growth and save vulnerable species from the verge of extinction.
    • Dugongs are protected in India under Schedule 1 of the Indian Wildlife Act 1972 which bans the killing and purchasing of dugong meat.
    • IUCN status: Vulnerable

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  • Universal Declaration of the Rights of Rivers

    Activists have highlighted the plight of rivers as well as the support building up for according rights to them under the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Rivers.

    What constitutes the Rights of Rivers?

    • Flow: If we look at a river as an ecosystem instead of cubic metres of water, then the ambit of rights gets broadened.
    • Flora and fauna: It includes aquatic flora and fauna, the biodiversity in its catchment areas, forests, its tributaries, groundwater, the rocks and soil in its bed and banks.
    • Human settlements: The rights of rivers in a sense would mean the ecological causes and conditions making up the natural habitat. Human settlements dependent is the prime factor.
    • Economy: Such rights should not put an end to fishing or other localized, subsistence-based human needs related to the river, but rather push for a healthy relationship respecting the river as an ecosystem.

    Universal Declaration of the Rights of Rivers

    • The declaration is a civil society initiative to define the basic rights to which all rivers are entitled, according to a note by non-profit, International Rivers.
    • This trend of granting rights to nature, taking place across the world, signals the beginnings of a radical shift from an extractive mindset to one where conservation safeguards are being extended to nature.
    • The right to recognize rivers as living entities rather than mere human property started in 2008.
    • That year, Ecuador became the first country to constitutionally recognize the Rights of Nature.

    Present campaigns

    • In the one year since the declaration, rights have been recognised or declared for the Boulder Creek watershed in the US, the Magpie River in Canada, the Alpayacu river in Ecuador and the Paraná river and its wetlands in Argentina.
    • Several campaigns calling for rights to be accorded to rivers have also incorporated the declaration.
    • These include campaigns for the Lempa river in El Salvador, Tavignanu river in France, Ethiope river in Nigeria, the Indus river in Pakistan and the Frome river in the UK.
    • In 2017, a treaty agreement between the Whanganui Iwi (a Māori tribe) and the New Zealand government recognized the Whanganui River as a legal person.

    Recognition of such rights in India

    • In 2017, the Uttarakhand HC ruled that the Indian rivers Ganga and Yamuna, the Gangotri and Yamunotri glaciers, as well as other related natural elements are “legal persons” with all corresponding rights, duties, and liabilities of a living person.
    • Subsequently, in 2018, the same high court ruled that the entire animal kingdom has rights equivalent to that of a living person.

    Challenges

    • Cultural practices: Activists and communities have been arguing for a need of cultural change that can bring about the ethic of care with regard to the rest of nature. Indigenous people have had such an ethic in their worldviews and ways of living.
    • Development paradigm: The most critical challenge is whether can rights be protected without changing the current development paradigm. Any paradigm shift also needs questioning of fundamental forms of injustices, including capitalism, statism, anthropocentrism, and patriarchy.
    • Cross-boundary issues: Rivers don’t necessarily follow human-made political boundaries. Indus, one of the longest that runs through China, Pakistan, and India, doesn’t flow as per political boundaries. Its contiguity demands a cross-boundary approach.
    • Cooperation deficit: There is still very limited understanding across the world on how a law on the rights of rivers can be implemented. What would be the best ways to ensure custodianship, restitution, compensation.

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  • Places in news: Gulf of Mexico

    An oil spill spanning at least 10 miles has been captured by satellite imagery in waters off the Louisiana coast near the Gulf of Mexico.

    Gulf of Mexico

    • The Gulf of Mexico is an ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent.
    • It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States; on the southwest and south by the Mexican states of Tamaulipas, Veracruz, Tabasco, Campeche, Yucatan, and Quintana Roo; and on the southeast by Cuba.
    • The US states of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida, which border the Gulf on the north, are often referred to as the “Third Coast” of the United States (in addition to its Atlantic and Pacific coasts).
    • It is covered with a tangle of pipes, wells and other energy infrastructure, much of it no longer used, as a result of generations of oil extraction there.

    Its formation

    • The Gulf of Mexico took shape approximately 300 million years ago as a result of plate tectonics.
    • Its floor consists of sedimentary rocks and recent sediments.
    • It is connected to the part of the Atlantic Ocean through the Florida Straits between the US and Cuba, and with the Caribbean Sea via the Yucatán Channel between Mexico and Cuba.
    • Because of its narrow connection to the Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf experiences very small tidal ranges.

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