Word: indianness
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Indolent cows languidly chewing their cud while befuddled motorists honk and maneuver their vehicles around them is an image as stereotypically Indian as saffron-clad holy men and the Taj Mahal. Now, however, India's ubiquitous cows - of which there are 283 million, more than anywhere else in the world - are assuming a more menacing role as they become part of the climate-change debate...
...belching and excreting copious amounts of methane - a greenhouse gas that traps 20 times more heat than carbon dioxide - India's livestock of roughly 485 million (including sheep and goats) contributes more to global warming than the vehicles the animals obstruct. With new research suggesting that methane emission by Indian livestock is higher than previously estimated, scientists are furiously working at designing diets to help bovines and other ruminants eat better, stay more energetic and secrete smaller amounts of the offensive gas. (See pictures of India's largest ruminant: the Asian elephant...
...starters, most Indian livestock is underfed and undernourished, unlike its robust counterparts in richer countries. The typical Indian farmer is unable to buy expensive dietary supplements even for livestock of productive age, and dry milch cattle and older farm animals are invariably turned out to fend for themselves. Poor-quality feed equals poor animal health as well as higher methane production. Also, even when Western firms are willing to share technology or when Western products are available, these options are often unaffordable for the majority in India. For instance, Monensin, an antibiotic whose slow-release formula reduces methane emission...
When the statistics showed a drop in piracy attacks off the coast of Somalia early this year, shipping companies and the foreign navies patrolling the Gulf of Aden thought they might finally be winning the battle of the Indian Ocean. But the past few days have proved that any talk of "mission accomplished" is premature...
...heavily patrolled gulf. "It's not that the navies have been unsuccessful," says Tony Mason, secretary-general of the London-based International Chamber of Shipping. "You can almost argue that they've been too successful, so the pirates have decided it's easier to go after targets in the Indian Ocean because the navies are not there and it's a much, much more difficult area to patrol because there's an awful lot more sea." (See pictures of Somalia's modern piracy...