Natural Resources
Resources provided to us by nature soil, air, water, forests, wildlife, coal and petroleum are used by man for his survival.
Types of Resources
- Exhaustible: present in limited quantity e.g. coal petroleum.
- Inexhaustible: present in unlimited quantity e.g. air, water.
Management of natural resources is needed for conservation of natural resources. There are National and International Laws and Acts to protect the environment.
Ganga Action Plan
Multi Crore Project came in 1985 to improve the quality of Ganga Contamination of river water is indicated by the presence of coli form (a group of bacteria found in human intestine) and acidic water (can be tested by the pH paper or pH meter).
1993-94 Total Coliform (MPN/100ml)
- Minimum found in Rishikesh 600-650 MPN/100ml
- Minimum desired level 450MPN/100ml
- Maximum found in Kannauj 1400MPN/100ml
The Three R’s to save the environment
The three R’s to save the environment are Reduce, Recycle and Reuse.
- Reduce: means using less of natural resources and avoiding wastage of natural resources.
- Recycle: means the materials like paper, plastic, glass, metals etc. used for making things can again be used for making new things instead of synthesizing or extracting new paper, plastic, glass or metals.
- Reuse: means using things again and again like the plastic bottles in which we buy jams, pickles etc. can be again used for storing things in the kitchen.
We must be careful about the effect our choices of living make on the environment. Economic development is linked to environmental development. Thus, sustainable development is important.
Sustainable Development
Economic development that is conducted without depletion of natural resources.
Sustainable development is way to use resources in such a way that our need fulfilled without compromising needs for future generation.
Why Do We Need To Manage Our Resources?
- they are limited in quantity.
- Due to increasing population, their demand has increased resulting in overuse of resources.
- These resources take a really long time to form thus depletion will cause problems for the future generations.