Industrial wastes and pollution
Visit a factory or a workshop and peak to its management. The factory or workshop need not be big. It could be a small one with two pr three workers. Find out about the product manufacture in the factory, the raw materials used, and synthetic chemicals and other wastes released in the manufacture of the product. How efficiently does the factory use water and electricity? What is the status of the workers health? What is being done to reduce pollution as part of the environmental production measures?
Present these findings for a group discussion in the class?
An ideal way to do this activity would be to visit the factory and have a first hand account of the visit. Take the consent of the management to visit the factory in group. Do not disturb the workers or the work.
Such visit will influence the factories to work in a more disciplined manner to reduce wastes.
You must observe and learn more. Gather more information about the factory by talking to people living nearby.
You may find that some factories reduce their pollution by treating the wastes, but some others do not bother.
Living condition in slums is terrible. Large families live in just one room and surroundings are dirty. Sanitation is poor. Many people share a common lavatory and there’s muck everywhere. This is the place where the poorest in society live. Yet, people living here are the ones who keeping the city clean and our houses tidy. They clear the waste that is everywhere in urban areas, on the roads, in the waste dumps or in nalas. They are paid very little and are given no choice but to live in slums. They work as sweepers or as domestic help in our houses, as newspaper boys, waste –pickers, milkmen, masons and so on who are over worked and underpaid. They live in conditions where there are no comforts and no basic amenities.
Beyond belief
Our society is a live organization. It responds to our collective problems. Those societies that do not show this response will that their problems become more severe over time difficult to solve at all.
Form groups and find out how an environmental problem is being addressed locally. What is the problem and how severe has it become? Who is responsible? What efforts are being made to solve the problem? For how long have efforts been made? What are the difficulties in solving the problem? What should be done to solve it acceptably? What role cans students, social service organizations and the government play in it? Make different group and discuss the issue. Convey your views and opinions through a report on the meeting to the authorities concerned.
Traditions –rules for all
Ask your elders or religious authorities about the significance of pilgrimages and also about offerings o the dead. Find out the reasons for the particular food items being eaten during these times. Ask them if any of these stipulations have changed over time. Analyze the environmental significance of the food chosen on the different occasions.
Our beliefs and environment
Find out how our beliefs and attitudes towards common birds and ani9mlas such as, snakes, pigeons and sparrows, are related to the environment. Know about the customs and attitudes that have evolved around such plants and trees as the basil, mango, banana, neem, peepal.
Events in human life and the environment
Discover and understand the religious practices, traditions and their environmentally significant implications that surround occasions like birthdays, marriage, deaths and those relating to the disposal of dead bodies.
Home –made medicine and the environment
Find out what homemade medicines our elders use to treat minor illnesses. Prepare a report on the uses of parts of plants: leaves, flowers, seeds, fruits or even the roots that form part of the Ayurveda and Unani systems of medicine. Tabulate the medicinal value of ginger, onions, pepper, asafetida, dates, cloves, lotus leaves, coriander seeds and other such things that are used in Indian cooking ad also have medical values. Bring your report to the notice of as may people as possible.
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