Chipko movement

The Chipko movement ( Chipko Movement) was a movement of villagers - especially women - in the region of Uttarakhand ( Uttaranchal ) in India, who opposed commercial logging and the resulting destruction of their livelihoods. The Chipko movement for their method was known to hug trees to prevent their precipitation. The name of the movement comes from the Hindi word for " hold " or " stay tuned ".

History

In the 1970s, many places have cut down massively in the Indian Himalayan Region. In particular, the locally adapted Banj ( Himalayan oaks ) were cut down forests and replaced by more profitable, but the location and unmatched foreign tree species. This led to a severe deterioration of the ecosystem, erosion and flooding increased and affected the livelihoods of the population.

Against this background, it came in April 1973 at the village of Mandal in the Alakananda valley to the first spontaneous Chipko action. There, a sporting goods company had received a concession for the exploitation of the forest, which had been previously denied the villagers wanted to win as this wood to make tools. Encouraged by a local NGO and led by the activist Chandi Prasad Bhatt, the local women went into the woods, formed a circle around the trees and prevented the loggers from cutting down the forest.

In the following years, the Chipko movement spread further. Influential leaders of the Chipko movement were Sudesha Devi, Chandi Prasad Bhatt, Bachhni Devi and Sunderlal Bahuguna. Vandana Shiva, too, was involved in the 1970s in the movement.

In many places it was possible the Chipko movement to prevent deforestation. In 1981, the government issued a ban on cutting trees in the higher elevations of the Himalayas. In 1987, the Chipko movement was awarded the Right Livelihood Award.

Shiva sees refutes the thesis that movements are initiated and maintained by outside, charismatic leaders in the structure of the Chipko movement. For them it is important here that ordinary women took care for a locally based management. The protest of the Chipko movement differs by Mies from earlier industrialism and progress criticism by the fact that the criticism of people is formulated, which are at the lowest level of global exploitation and distribution pyramid and not only of the urban middle class of the developed countries.

Precursor

Actions similar to those of the Chipko Movement, India had previously, when translated, the Bishnoi against the felling of trees Khejri by soldiers of the Maharaja of Jodhpur to the military in 1730 in the village Khejarli in Rajasthan. This should be killed 363 villagers. However, the protest was finally successful, and the Maharaja issued a decree against deforestation.