“The new normal will keep harmony between humans and mother nature”

In light of recent climate changes seen around the world, how do you view the pandemic? Can it be a force for change? 

The main driving force of climate change is the greenhouse gases that are sent into the earth’s atmosphere. All those greenhouse gases sent into the atmosphere trap even more radiated solar heat from the earth’s surface, raising temperatures worldwide and so altering global climate. The heats are absorbed in the oceans resulting in rising water temperatures. The excess energy has fuelled many of the hurricanes in the recent past. A warmer atmosphere is also responsible for the catastrophic flood. In other areas, rainfall is decreasing and heat waves are becoming more frequent and prolonged, resulting in devastating wildfires.

In all such ways, mother nature is striking back. With the wave of COVID-19 engulfing the whole world and disrupting human lives around the world. The whole world has seen the power being given back to mother nature from humans. The world has seen good air quality in the worst affected areas in the world, wildlife on streets, clean rivers, clean sea beaches. In a way, we can say mother nature is indicating us to co-exist with nature.

Will COVID-19 have a long-term impact on the environment? 

In a matter of months, the world has seen millions of people getting affected, thousands have lost their lives from the novel coronavirus. With the COVID-19 the human race has seen an entirely different way of life. The whole world is practising social distancing and working remotely bringing the travel industry, entertainment zones and all the places where the social gathering is possible to a standstill. It is all aimed at controlling the spread of Covid-19, and hopefully reducing the death toll.

But all this change has also led to some unexpected consequences. As industries, transport networks and businesses have closed down, it has brought a sudden drop in carbon emissions. The biggest environmental impact we have seen is a drop in the consumption of our natural resources. People are developing new means and measures to not disrupt the available resources which have led to the adoption of more renewable sources. Adoption of the renewable source will take time but eventually, it will be the new normal which will keep harmony among the human race and mother nature.

What is the impact of lesser pollution on the planet?  

With people contained in their homes and very minimalistic movement of people, we have seen great improvement in air quality, very clean rivers have been observed due to non-dumping of industrial wastes, wildlife gaining its space etc. These observations were made in merely 1 month of lockdown. This simply indicates how badly we have treated our environment and took everything for granted.

Will the new order of things lead to a more humane approach in businesses, restore the balance between humans and nature?  

We human beings are hugely selfish, we tend to forget past very quickly. If we would not have been selfish enough, World War II would never have taken place. We have intentionally participated in the race of being superior. Now with the very rapid spread of COVID 19, nature has indicated that nature is superior to all human beings and we should learn from the mistakes we made in our past.

With the high demand for gasoline, we have seen a huge dependency on our natural resources, but the same demand has no worth because the world is experiencing lockdown. This should be taken as an indicator to contain our dependency on natural resources and we should move more towards renewable sources to compensate for our demands. I suppose this to be the right moment for us to explore options to maintain harmony between humans and nature