Revitalization of Rivers in India Draft Policy - Isha Guru Jaggi Vasudev

Revitalization of Rivers In India
Draft Policy Recommendation
In the context of that national objective, it is useful to note that one
fruit tree approximately absorbs 4.22 gm of carbon per hour. One square
kilometer of tree cover has the potential of sequestering 3,500 tonnes
of CO 2
per year at 400 trees per acre. So 2000 square kilometers of tree
cover has the potential of absorbing 7 million tonnes of CO 2
per year.
Across the 20,000 km of river length in the country, that represents a
reduction of 140 million tonnes of CO 2
per year. That makes a significant
6% contribution to the national carbon footprint reduction goal via
forest covers. This 6% is a conservative estimate – it is likely to be higher
because we haven’t accounted for two factors: the relatively higher carbon
sequestering ability of a multipurpose tree versus a fruit tree; and the fact
that we would save methane emission from annual crops like paddy by
flood irrigation which has much higher global warming ability.
Carbon farming 45 is agriculture’s answer to climate change. Simply
put, the goal is to take excess carbon out of the atmosphere, where the
element causes global warming, and store it in the soil, where carbon
aids the growth of plants. The principle is pretty straightforward—the
practice, not so much. 46 The reduction of temperature in the riverine
ecosystem results in reduction in riverbank temperature relative to the
river water temperature. This will lead to recharge of groundwater, and
will also prevent loss of nutrients in soil into the river.
Non-destructively harvested perennial (NDHP) crops is a
categorization of plants/trees that can meet human needs of oil,
carbohydrates, proteins and energy, by not destroying them after they
yield their produce. Replacing perennial crops that are destroyed every
year after the yielding of the produce with NDHP crops, we ensure that
the soil is not tilled and therefore the organic carbon is intact. No tillage
also saves energy that is spent by machinery used for this purpose. 47
An excerpt from the book on Carbon Farming, that looks at trees and
tree-based farming as a solution to the climate change conditions that
perennial crops suffer is presented in Annexure 8.
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