Tanneries to pay up for ruining crops

The Loss of Ecology Authority for Tamil Nadu has asked 547 tanneries in Vellore district to pay Rs 2.91 crore as compensation to 1,180 farmers for damaging their crops between 1991and 1998 by polluting the river Palar. The authority on Monday issued individual notices to these tanneries to pay up.
Polluters of Palar may have continue paying such compensation to farmers, as the authority has the mandate to investigate and award compensation to Vellore district farmers for the subsequent 10-year period from 1999 as well.
The Loss of Ecology (Prevention & Payments of Compensation) Authority was set up in 1996 by the Central government based on a Supreme Court directive, while hearing a petition from the Vellore Citizens’ Welfare Forum against the rampant pollution caused by untreated effluents from tanneries.
In notices sent to the tanners, the authority’s member-secretary K Venkataraman asked them to pay the compensation amount to the Vellore district collector under the head Environment Protection Fund’ within 30 days of receiving the notice.
According to authority officials, effluents discharged by the 547 tanneries in seven taluks had damaged 1,150 hectares of land owned by 1,180 farmers. These farmers had been left out when three earlier instalments of compensation were awarded. In the first phase, the body had ordered compensation of Rs 26 crore to 29,193 farmers in 188 villages in which farming was affected in about 15,164 hectares. The compensation was for the loss of revenue through agriculture in 1991-98.
As thousands of farmers continued to petition the authority, the body awarded two more instalments of compensation amounting to Rs 1.88 crore and Rs 61.76 lakh to 1281 and 448 farmers respectively, officials said. From November 2009, the authority will begin inspection of the affected farmlands for awarding compensation for the next 10-year period, they added.
Asked about the farmers’ grievance that the compensation was less than the value of the actual damage, sources in the authority said there were four classes under which the compensation was awarded, depending on the TDS (totally dissolved solid) level. There is no compensation if the TDS level in the farm wells is below 1000 ppm (particles per million). For TDS ranging from 1000 to 2100, the farmers get a compensation of Rs 7,400 per ha.
The compensation is Rs 14,800 per ha for wells with TDS range between 2,100 and 3,500 ppm and Rs 48,100 per ha for those with TDS between 3,500 and 4,900 ppm. If the TDS level is above 4,900 ppm in a well, the farmer gets a compensation of Rs 1.03 lakh per hectare.
Despite the order by the Supreme Court to collect the compensation within a specified time frame, Vellore district officials admit that it takes time to get it from the polluters for distributing to farmers. “At present, 75% of compensation has been disbursed to the farmers,’’ said a district official.

TN gets one more sanctuary in Sathyamangalam

Finally, the state government is all set to declare an ecologically ‘complete’ and sensitive wild habitat in Sathyamangalam forest division as a sanctuary. Once a refuge for Veerappan, the forest range will now be a sanctuary for wildlife.
State forest minister N Selvaraj signed the file this week paving the way for the forest department to notify about 500 sq.km of open jungle with the Moyar river acting as the bridge between the western and eastern ghats. It will be named as Sujal Kuttai blackbuck sanctuary. In the last wildlife census, it was found that there were
about 2,000 blackbuck.
“The sanctuary is the key to genetic flow between the western and eastern ghats,’’ says a forest officer. The open jungle and the riverine ecosystem facilitates the movement of large mammals like elephants from Mudumalai wildlife sanctuary and Nilgiris North Division to the Eastern Ghats along the Moyar river.
Recent studies have revealed that there are about 10 tigers in Sathyamangalam forest division covering 1450 sq.km, including the new sanctuary. “The sanctuary will be a great boon to conservation as it will be contiguous with Mudumalai, Wayanad, Bandipur and Nagarhole sanctuaries and national parks, making it one of the largest wildlife habitats in the country,’’ says K Kalidasan, a Coimbatore-based environmentalist.
The Sujal Kuttai sanctuary, including the scenic Thengumarahada, has been found to be the only home for vultures in the state. In a census, about 150 vultures were found in the habitat. The latest to be sighted were long-billed and whitebacked vultures, said a forester in the new sanctuary, defining it as a complete ecosystem with the prey, predators and scavengers (hyenas) co-existing.

Algae bloom in Gulf Of Mannar, Oxygen level rises

Marine organisms in the fragile Gulf of Mannar ecosystem can now breathe easy. Scientists say the algal bloom that caused a ‘major mortality’ of coral fish and other organisms in the calm waters of the bio-reserve has subsided.
However, more issues are waiting to be resolved, if the native eco-system in the 21 islands that form the biosphere are to be saved. Marine experts are surveying the entire biosphere to look for lurking dangers, after the unusual bloom of Noctiluca scintillans, the algal species, had a killer effect a few days ago.
Over 5,000 coral fish died on the seaward side of Vaalai Island, one of the 21 islands constituting the Gulf of Mannar Marine Bio-reserve (GoMBR), and both ‘minor’ and ‘medium’ mortality was noticed towards the coast. Major mortality means the death of over 1,000 fish in a one-kilometre radius. Organisms that died included eels, sea bass, hardy head, grouper, squirrel fish, silver bellies, parrot fish, rabbit fish and gobids, all slowmoving coral fish species. The crabs captured by the bottom set gill net were found moulted and some were dead. Scheduled species like sea turtles, sea cucumbers and a sea cow also died.
Analysis of the dead fish indicated a slight choking of their gills. A low level of oxygen and high level of ammonia could have triggered their death, according to the fisheries department’s report. Studies have revealed that the oxygen levels at the sea bottom was only 0.7 mg per litre compared to the required oxygen levels of 4.5 to
6 mg per litre in the gulf, basically because of the proliferation of the alga by nearly 50 times in every litre of water. One reason for the algal bloom could be the nutrient-rich waters of the gulf, but corals mainly survive in low-nutrient waters. The enriched nutrients are either the result of upward current or due to the mix of sewage let into the gulf by 20-odd town panchayats dotting the coast and the industrial pollution from the Thoothukudi town in the southern end of the biosphere, say scientists.
A study by the Fisheries College in Thoothukudi (Tuticorin) has revealed that the coastal population near the Gulf of Mannar has shot up by 35% between 1990 and 2008. Unlike in the Andamans, where the presence of the coral reefs is far away from the shore, the distance between in the Gulf of Mannar is a mere eight km. Better sewage management in town panchayats and stricter pollution control measures in Thoothukudi have to be taken up immediately, say scientists.

Megamalai forest now a sanctuary, to be expanded

Declaring 140 sq km of reserve forest in Megamalai in Theni district as a wildlife sanctuary, the government is in the final stages of reclassifying nearly 300 sq km of reserve land under forest department as reserve forests to be part of the newly created sanctuary.
According to forest officials, the reserve forest stretch from Erasanayakkanur on the side of Suruli falls to and Mel Gudalur on the Kumuli hills has been declared as Megamalai wildlife sanctuary, which would be contiguous with Periyar Tiger Reserve across the border in Kerala.
Megamalai is home to a rich diversity of flora and fauna — resident and migratory elephants are a common sight; direct sighting of tigers was reported in the Vellimalai forests in the census this year; it’s home to panthers, leopards, sloth bears, slender loris, Lion-tailed macaque (LTM) and the Nilgiri Tahr, the state animal, in the upper reaches of the ranges, say foresters.
While wildlife activists are thrilled to have a new sanctuary, they also want over 300 sq km of reserve land in Megamalai and Highways divisions in the Theni district forests to be declared part of the sanctuary. “Conservation will get a real boost only when the reserve lands are classified as reserve forests and made part of the
sanctuary,” says T S Subramaniaraja of Wildlife Association of Rajapalayam.
“After the reclassification and notification, Megamalai sanctuary would link the Srivilliputhur Grizzled Squirrel Sanctuary and Periyar Tiger Reserve enabling easy movement of wildlife in an expanded and protected landscape of about 1750 sq km of contiguous forests which could later become a biosphere ecosystem,” Subramaniaraja says. The state’s forests are already part of the Nilgiris biosphere and Agasthiyarmalai biosphere. “The Megamalai and Highways divisions, comprising reserve land, are the core habitat for wildlife. A recent study revealed the presence of at least 264 LTMs. Nilgiri Tahr was sighted in large groups in at least four peaks,” says Dr C P Rajkumar, managing trustee, Vanam, an eco-NGO based in Theni town. The deer population is also abundant. Sambar, mouse deer, barking deer and spotted deer are found in the region. “This is a critical habitat for lesser fauna. There is no point in leaving out these two divisions as there would always be a disconnect between Periyar and Srivilliputhur sanctuaries,” Rajkumar notes.
Ironically, the government has been sitting on the file to convert the reserve land in the two divisions into reserved forests (so that it could be declared as a sanctuary) for over eight years. “The government does not have the will power to remove a few villages that have encroached into the land due to vote bank politics,” says a senior forest official. Forest officials said the presence of humans in the forest land has led to stray incidents of poaching.
When contacted, senior forest officials said the government was in the final stages reclassifying reserve land in Megamalai as reserve forests to make it part of the newly created sanctuary.

Industrial effluents threaten drinking water sources in Cauvery, Palar

Industrial effluents from tanneries and dyeing units discharged into the Palar and Cauvery river basins do not just affect the farming community, but pose a grave threat to drinking water sources in the state’s western and northern districts.
According to a classified document of the municipal administration and water supply department, the industrial and municipal sewage directly discharged into the river systems is polluting the drinking water headworks located in the riverbeds, especially in Palar and Cauvery. The document, which also suggested that a high level panel be formed to look into the issue, was prepared a year ago by a department under deputy chief minister MK Stalin, but no action has been taken on it since, sources say.
River Palar provides water to most of the towns in Vellore, Tiruvannamalai and Kancheepuram districts. It is from Palar that 300 million litres per day is pumped out for the 203 combined water supply schemes. According to the document, the effluents, discharged directly into the Palar from places like Vaniyambadi, Ambur, Ranipet and Vellore (the state’s leather belt), travel a long distance along the riverbed and pollute the drinking water headworks en route.
According to sources, the TWAD has about 40 drinking water headworks to serve the population of Vellore and Tiruvannamalai districts. Almost all of them are at risk of being polluted by effluent discharges, particularly from the tannery clusters upstream. “The pollution affects water headworks in a 100-km stretch along the river
bed,” admitted a senior official seeking anonymity. “We have been taking samples for effective monitoring. It is really getting dangerous, particularly due to totally dissolved solids (TDS).
Occasionally, we shift to alternative sites for pumping out drinking water,” said an engineer. According to WHO standards, the TDS levels have to be below 500 parts per million (ppm). The Tamil Nadu government has already “diluted” the standard to below 2,000 ppm, as the level fit for drinking. According to sources, the levels of TDS polluting the headworks range from 5,000 ppm to 20,000 ppm.
The TWAD Board has a lab in Vellore to test the quality of water, and therefore has an opportunity to seek alternative sources of water when a particular headwork gets polluted. But there are many town panchayats and panchayats which have their own drinking water schemes and which could be drawing the polluted water directly from the borewells and supplying it without realising the presence of hazardous chemicals, TWAD sources say.
The board submitted a report to the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) four months ago, urging it to act fast. It is the same in the case of the 31 combined water supply schemes in the Cauvery and Bhavani river basins, which are polluted mainly by over a thousand dyeing units and a thousand bleaching units discharging effluents with a high concentration of TDS directly into the river systems.
The headworks for these 31 schemes supply 168 million litres of water per day, benefiting a population of 13.75 lakh in the districts of Coimbatore, Erode, Salem, Namakkal, Karur and Tiruchi.

Invasive species, a big threat to biodiversity

After habitat destruction, ‘invasive alien’ species is proving to be the biggest threat to biodiversity in the Nilgiris Biosphere Reserve. But state authorities are yet to realise the fact.
In a recent investigation, Prof VS Ramachandran of Bharathiar University found that 223 species of angiosperms (flowering plants) belonging to 56 families have naturalised in the Nilgiris Biosphere Reserve alone.
Invasive alien species are plants that are not endemic to a place. For instance, a croton variety found in Kalakkadu Mundanthurai Tiger Reserve in Tirunelveli district in 1991 was found to have come from Vavuniya along with the Tamil militants who used the forests for training, says a forest officer.
With the increase in number of alien plant species and their density in the bio-reserve, research and knowledge on alien species are required to assist in the development of effective control strategies, says V S Ramachandran, a professor of botany.
From previous studies, Ramachandran found that an orchid and two types of grass species show different types of growth under the native habitat (shola forests and open grasslands) and a habitat dominated by an invasive species (eucalyptus and wattle). While the growth was 40–45 cm in the former, it was 15 cm in the eucalyptus forest.
New roads are the most common reason for introduction of alien species resulting in loss of species and sometimes even extinction of a few plants. In Mudumalai forests, lantana camara, an obnoxious weed, spread like wild fire, obstructing the growth of other plants. Such invasive weeds also curb the movement of animals, says S Jeyachandran, secretary, Tamil Nadu Green Movement.
The eco-activist, based in Udhagamandalam, charges that the forest department has had no lantana eradication programme in its working plans over the years. Only now, the field director of Project Tiger has taken up the task of clearing the exotic plant that has invaded into the core zone of the tiger reserve.
According to scientists and activists, forest managers in Rajasthan have used a spray to stop the spread of lantana. In Himachal Pradesh, furniture is being made from twigs of lantana. “The invasiveness of lantana is a national issue. The Tamil Nadu government must first realise the destruction of forest habitat due to invasive plants. Only then, there can be an eradication programme,’’ says K Kalidas, president, OSAI, an NGO.

Turtle conservation gets a boost

Not too long ago, eggs of the endangered Olive Ridley turtles, were toys in the hands of children. Now, school children are among the key advocates in coastal community groups trying to save hatchlings of the sea turtles, whose numbers had been dwindling fast.
For the change of community’s attitude, Dr Supraja Dharini, founder of Tree Foundation, has received an associate award of the Whitley Award (Green Oscar) that carries 10,000 pounds for conservation of Olive Ridleys and dolphins along the Kancheepuram coast.
Dharini might have been the last to get into the conservation of the turtles, often referred to as ambassadors of the ocean. It was the renowned herpetologist Romulus Whitaker who initiated the nation’s first sea turtle conservation in the city’s coast way back in 1970s.
Dharini set up the Trust for Environment Education (TREE) foundation in 2002 to spread awareness and importance of sea turtles among school children, youth, SHGs and trawler owners. A volunteer group of young fishermen has been formed to protect, relocate eggs and release hatchlings into the sea as turtles are most vulnerable when
they first hatch, says S Vimal Raj, a trustee of the Foundation.
The number of nests has risen from 27 to 90 in the last six years with the number of hatchlings going up to 8,821 from 2,222. Boys who used turtle eggs as their play things are now carefully relocating them to enclosures, protecting them until they hatch and carefully delivering each one of the babies to safety at the ocean’s edge,
giving the turtles a chance for survival.
“The Olive Ridley turtle population is going down. A ban on trawlers and lights on beaches during the next mating season (Jan-April) could help turtle conservation,” says Vimal.