Family Environmental History
March 29, 2025 By: Agambir Bandesha
My parents emigrated from Northern India to Ontario Canada in the early 2000’s. The historical environments of my family have mainly been rural and suburban locations in India and Canada. I will show how differences in generational values have influenced views and relationships to the environment for different generations in our family.
My grandparents were born and raised in India, in the city of Amritsar. Occupationally my grandfather worked at a local university. On my fathers side, my grandfather worked for an early telecommunications company. He traveled from a rural village to a major city to conduct business and provide for the family. This enabled my father to get a degree in electrical engineering within India. After working locally, he emigrated the family to Canada in pursuit of future opportunities for my brother and I. Because of this, my own experiences differ greatly having spent half my life in Canada and the other in California.
In older societies, the local communities had managed the environmental resources with care as to avoid many undesired consequences of use that would cause a severe depletion of resources. The rural communities lived a life of balance with nature, satisfying basic needs which did not greatly strain the environment (Saravanan, 2020).
Management of water resources has been a significant challenge for India, Canada, and California. This has been a shared environmental concern for all generations of my family. Despite living in different circumstances over time, the seriousness of the water management challenge and signs of water scarcity has remained constant. Population growth, economic development, expansion of irrigated agriculture and the enormous growth of cities led to dramatic increases in water use during the 20th century (Chakrabarti, 2020).
Diminishing sources of water, unpredictability of rainfall and increasing demand of water per person for the rising middle class of cities has been central to discussion of the water crisis. Policymakers and engineers have always tried to find newer sources of water to cope with the increasing demand in cities. Over-exploitation of river regimes, destruction of surface water sources, reduction of the diversified sources, and depletion of groundwater are all common in the history of water challenges (Saravanan, 2020).
Cities are also major modifiers of the physical environment. They can influence the course of basic physical processes, such as the hydraulic cycle. Urbanization removes a lot of the filtering capacity of soil and rapidly channels precipitation into available watercourses, thus encouraging flooding. City building affects the atmosphere by increasing air-borne pollutants and also creating heat islands where temperatures are greater than the surrounding area. Various urban activities produce huge volumes of waste products which require complex disposal mechanisms (Chakrabarti, 2020).
Owing to increased levels of urbanization, I have perceived a less harmonious relationship between nature and humanity. Urban cities I grew up in were often industrialized, with buildings taking the place of natural ecosystems. This is in stark contrast to the more rural, sustainable farming practices of my grandparents home villages. Cities have now been intimately linked to the environment and caused enormous damage to the environment. To understand the depth of these new modern problems and to minimize environmental risks in the future, environmentalists and policymakers need to learn from history. It would be beneficial to unearth the history of traditional sustainable practices to minimize future risk.
For generations, human settlements have come up and flourished around water bodies, including Sacramento and villages in India. Initially, water from streams and rivers was used for drinking and for cultivation. These water resources, which are common property resources, were managed and maintained by the local communities. This traditional water management system ensured sustainable water supply to the people. Water from different resources was used to cultivate crops, mainly for local consumption. However, this traditional water management system has been undermined ever since companies gave priority to establish major irrigation projects. Already, conflicts have emerged within and between basins, between the states, among the states and between countries (Saravanan, 2020).
In conclusion, I am grateful to have lived in many different environments with diverse exposure to various cultures. Moving to Canada and subsequently California has allowed me to gain an appreciation of the importance between striking a balance between personal needs and the needs of the environment. Going forward, it will be necessary to embrace the challenges that come with living in fragile ecosystems. With the increasing water scarcity problems facing both California and Canada, humanity and nature will need to better sustain each other better.
References:
Chakrabarti, R. (2020). Critical Themes in Environmental History of India. Sage Publications Pvt. Ltd.
Saravanan, V. (2020). Water and the Environmental History of Modern India. Bloomsbury Academic.