The environmental movement, is a social movement that aims to protect the natural world from harmful environmental practices in order to create sustainable living. Environmentalists advocate the just and sustainable management of resources and stewardship of the environment through changes in public policy and individual behavior. In its recognition of humanity as a participant in ecosystems, the movement is centered on ecology, health, as well as human rights.
The conservation movement, also known as nature conservation, is a political, environmental, and social movement that seeks to manage and protect natural resources, including animal, fungus, and plant species as well as their habitat for the future. Conservationists are concerned with leaving the environment in a better state than the condition they found it in. Evidence-based conservation seeks to use high quality scientific evidence to make conservation efforts more effective.
The Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) is Australia's national environmental organisation, launched in 1965 in response to a proposal by the World Wide Fund for Nature for a more co-ordinated approach to sustainability.
Lester Russel Brown is an American environmental analyst, founder of the Worldwatch Institute, and founder and former president of the Earth Policy Institute, a nonprofit research organization based in Washington, D.C. BBC Radio commentator Peter Day referred to him as "one of the great pioneer environmentalists."
The Isha Foundation is a nonprofit, spiritual organisation that was founded in 1992 near Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India, by Sadhguru. It hosts the Isha Yoga Centre, which offers yoga programs under the name Isha Yoga. The foundation is run "almost entirely" by volunteers. According to Sadhguru, the word isha means "the formless divine".
Rajendra Singh is an Indian water conservationist and environmentalist from Alwar district, Rajasthan in India. Also known as "waterman of India", he won the Magsaysay Award in 2001 and Stockholm Water Prize in 2015. He runs an NGO called 'Tarun Bharat Sangh' (TBS), which was founded in 1975. The NGO based in village hori-Bhikampura in Thanagazi tehsil, near Sariska Tiger Reserve, has been instrumental in fighting the slow bureaucracy, mining lobby and has helped villagers take charge of water management in their semi-arid area as it lies close to Thar Desert, through the use of johad, rainwater storage tanks, check dams and other time-tested as well as path-breaking techniques. Starting from a single village in 1985, over the years TBS helped build over 8,600 johads and other water conservation structures to collect rainwater for the dry seasons, has brought water back to over 1,000 villages and revived five rivers in Rajasthan, Arvari, Ruparel, Sarsa, Bhagani and Jahajwali. He is one of the members of the National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA) which was set up in 2009, by the Government of India as an empowered planning, financing, monitoring and coordinating authority for the Ganges (Ganga), in exercise of the powers conferred under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986. In the UK he is a founder member of an NGO called the Flow Partnership which aims to counter the negative effects of soil erosion and flooding.
Mullaperiyar Dam is a masonry gravity dam on the Periyar River of Idukki district of Indian state of Kerala. It is situated 150km south east of Kochi. It is located 881 m (2,890 ft) above the sea level, on the Cardamom Hills of the Western Ghats in Thekkady, Idukki District of Kerala, India. It was constructed between 1887 and 1895 by John Pennycuick and also reached in an agreement to divert water eastwards to the Madras Presidency area. It has a height of 53.6 m (176 ft) from the foundation, and a length of 365.7 m (1,200 ft). The Periyar National Park in Thekkady is located around the dam's reservoir. The dam is built at the confluence of Mullayar and Periyar rivers. The dam is located in Kerala on the river Periyar, but is operated and maintained by the neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu. Although the Periyar River has a total catchment area of 5398 km2 with 114 km2 downstream from the dam in Tamil Nadu, the catchment area of the Mullaperiyar Dam itself lies entirely in Kerala and thus not an inter-State river. On 21 November 2014, the water level hit 142 feet for first time in 35 years. The reservoir again hit the maximum limit of 142 feet on 15 August 2018, following incessant rains in the state of Kerala. In a UN report published in 2021, the dam was identified as one among the world's big dams which needs to be decommissioned for being 'situated in a seismically active area with significant structural flaws and poses risk to 3.5 million people if the 100+ years old dam were to fail'.
Sadhguru is the founder and head of the Isha Foundation, based in Coimbatore, India. The foundation, established in 1992, operates an ashram and yoga centre that carries out educational and spiritual activities. Sadhguru has been teaching yoga since 1982. He is the author of the New York Times bestsellers Inner Engineering: A Yogi's Guide to Joy and Karma: A Yogi's Guide to Crafting Your Destiny, and a frequent speaker at international forums.
The Columbia Water Center (CWC) was established in January 2008 by Columbia University as part of the Earth institute to research and address global water-related challenges, including water scarcity, access and quality alongside Climate risks and changes.
M. K. Prasad was an Indian environmentalist known for his grassroots level activism to protect tropical rainforests in the Indian state of Kerala. In the late 1970s, as a member of Kerala Sasthra Sahithya Parishad, he led the Save Silent Valley movement, to prevent development of a hydroelectric project in the Silent Valley National Park, a project that would have flooded the rainforest.
Anupam Mishra was an Indian Gandhian, author, journalist, environmentalist, TED speaker, and water conservationist who worked on promoting water conservation, water management and traditional rainwater harvesting techniques. He had been awarded the 1996 Indira Gandhi Paryavaran Puraskar (IGPP) award instituted by the Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of India. He travelled to villages across several Indian states, especially Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Uttar Pradesh, describing the value of time-tested systems of water harvesting. He advocated conservation of traditional water structures in India as well as abroad. He wrote books like Aaj Bhi Khare Hain Talaab and Rajasthan Ki Rajat Boondein, landmark works in the field of water conservation. An extensive interview with Mishra about the history and future of the Yamuna River occupies the last chapter of Rana Dasgupta's book Capital: The Eruption of Delhi.
Among Bhutan's most pressing environmental issues are traditional firewood collection, crop and flock protection, and waste disposal, as well as modern concerns such as industrial pollution, wildlife conservation, and climate change that threaten Bhutan's population and biodiversity. Land and water use have also become matters of environmental concern in both rural and urban settings. In addition to these general issues, others such as landfill availability and air and noise pollution are particularly prevalent in relatively urbanized and industrialized areas of Bhutan. In many cases, the least financially and politically empowered find themselves the most affected by environmental issues.
Water Literacy Foundation is a non-governmental environmental organisation based in Bangalore, Karnataka, whose high goal is to make India a "water-efficient nation" by raising awareness about water scarcity and establishing rainwater harvesting in all areas of India.
Organizations which currently undertake coral reef and atoll restoration projects using simple methods of plant propagation:
Pavan Sukhdev is an Indian environmental economist whose field of studies include green economy and international finance. He was the Special Adviser and Head of UNEP's Green Economy Initiative, a major UN project suite to demonstrate that greening of economies is not a burden on growth but rather a new engine for growing wealth, increasing decent employment, and reducing persistent poverty. Pavan was also the Study Leader for the ground breaking TEEB study commissioned by G8+5 and hosted by UNEP. Under his leadership, TEEB sized the global problem of biodiversity loss and ecosystem degradation in economic and human welfare terms, and proposed solutions targeted at policy-makers, administrators, businesses and citizens. TEEB presented its widely acclaimed Final Report suite at the UN meeting by Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in Nagoya, Japan.
Dr. Hariharan Chandrashekar is an Indian ecological economist, founding and presiding over urban people-led movements for urban sustainability on water and energy, a mentor for green enterprise and entrepreneurs, and enabler of industry directions on sustainability and resilience, at the building scale and the city scale.
S M Sehgal Foundation is an Indian NGO focused on rural development with its head office in Gurugram, Haryana. It was founded as an Indian public, charitable trust in 1999 by plant geneticist Suri Sehgal and his wife Mrs. Edda Sehgal, who together had accumulated wealth through the 1998 sale of their hybrid seed businesses, Proagro Group.
Pacific Forest Trust is an accredited non-profit conservation land trust that advances forest conservation and stewardship solutions. Its mission is to sustain America's forests for their public benefits of wood, water, wildlife, and people's wellbeing, in cooperation with landowners and communities.
The BAPS Hindu Mandir Abu Dhabi in the UAE, is a traditional Hindu mandir built by the BAPS Swaminarayan Sanstha. Inspired by Pramukh Swami Maharaj (1921–2016) and consecrated by Mahant Swami Maharaj on 14 February 2024, this is the first traditional Hindu mandir in Abu Dhabi.
Anita Soina is a Kenyan environmentalist by passion and also water and climate change advocate from the Maasai community. She is the author of the book Green War.
