Orissa

Study finds, only one out of five river basins in the country can cope with climate change

Cyclone Bulbul causes devastation in West Bengal and Odisha

Centre to provide 43-55 litre/day water per person to rural households by 2024

There are studies and field reports that have analysed the Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM) in terms of coverage and use of toilets in rural India. The official government survey, the NARSS 2018-19, shows that 93 percent of rural households have access to a toilet and 96 percent of those having a toilet use them.

The water sector remains male dominated at different scales, from engineers and technocrats responsible for designing irrigation systems, to upper caste and upper class men who decide on the location of canals, borewells, tanks, and other water systems at the grassroots level. While women are involved in the daily management of water for food production, especially on small farms, they have little say in water provisioning decisions.

In recent years, cycles of extreme drought and severe flooding have affected the country’s water availability and crop production. The trend can be attributed to climate change. Scientists have been exploring drought and flood tolerant crop varieties to offset stress conditions that significantly constrain rice production. With the development of new drought and flood-tolerant rice varieties, agriculture scientists hope to ease water constraints and ensure food security.

Odisha's ecological hotspots severely affected by cyclone

Life is getting back to normal after an ‘extremely severe’ cyclonic storm Fani hit India’s eastern coastline. It ripped through several districts of Odisha and West Bengal and brought in torrential rains and winds of up to 200 km/hr. But improved responses to the disaster by way of timely warning, advance planning, evacuation, rescue and restoration operations helped mitigate casualties and damage to the region.

Droughts are one of the most feared natural calamities impacting agriculture and food production as well as the morale of millions of farmers in India. Recent studies show that the frequency of droughts is increasing. While droughts are known to cause severe rural distress, little is known on how gender influences the experiences of men and women in coping with droughts.

Cyclone Fani, strongest to hit India in 20 years, causes widespread destruction in Odisha