Need for proper management of natural resources in Rajasthan

New study recommends “value formation” at the community level Jaipur

The Rajasthan Government should take the initiative for proper management of natural resources with emphasis on “value formation” at the community level. It may look for strengthening its integration with civil society organizations, If needed and local institutions in rural areas for the purpose, recommends a new study on “Institutional reforms for alternative, ecologically sensitive and people friendly development in televisions” here

While making these recommendations, the study has underlined the need to ensure that the benefits from the local resource base are not seized by the powerful sections alone.

Sunil Ray, Senior Fellow of the Jaipur based Institute of Development studies (IDS) conducted the three-year-long study under a project supported by the food foundation. Prof. Roy made the interdisciplinary research in the five selected areas spread over different agro-climatic zones in the state. He found that the incidence of impoverishment in rural Rajasthan was directly linked with the degree of vulnerability of people to the growing crisis of renewable natural resources. It has a paralytic impact on the local economy that cannot be explained by the standard tools of economic analysis. The debate with in the political economy framework revolves around skewed distribution of command over rich stock of renewable resources, such as drinking water, irrigation water, land with good forest cover or posture land with better yield of grass. Prof Ray said the conflicts in these areas were unavoidable due to the increasing gap between low generation and rising demand.

The professor called for bringing the missing link between poverty reduction and ecological restoration to the center of development discourse. “Institutional interventions in some case in Rajasthan succeeded in restoring a degraded ecosystem by expanding bio-diversity and ensured livelihood during a prolonged drought spell,” he said.

The study also revealed that the community institutional approach for revival of the common resource base had gained social legitimacy and momentum in some parts of the State when the degradation reached the point of no return. Social networking, mutual trust and reciprocity created conditions for emergence of new practices for restoration of ecosystem and its sustainable development

“If tree lopping and grass being regularly grazed by animals are also calculated, the estimated value will be much more,” added Prof. Ray. He said the state Govt. should evolve an appropriate management strategy to tap common-pool natural resources, the property rights of which were yet to be clearly defined.

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