The Future of Sustainability: Have Your Say!

Week Two - “Human Wellbeing and Sustainability”
Comment / Comentario / Commentaire

Suresh Kumar, Regional Research Laboratory Trivandrum, India

Moderating team: Suresh Kumar describes a small Indian community that lives in a sustainable and ethical way. He provides this description of how to live the “good life” as an example to be studied, emulated and replicated appropriately.

Sureh Kumar describe una comunidad hindú que vive bajo los principios de la sostenibilidad y la ética. Este ejemplo del “buen vivir” debería ser estudiado, emulado y replicado apropiadamente.

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The article raises some fundamental issues about defining good life in the context of sustainability and whether IUCN has a role in wider communication of the message for its adoption by wider segments of the people.

What I would like to point out here is some lessons from an example of community living that i have witnessed and which can be adopted in an appropriate form by developing communities to start with.

People in this community have common property and common facilities in adequate quantities. Their dwellings are separate, yet contiguous such that privacy is ensured to an extent. The houses are moderately built without much opulence, by pooling of resources within limits. They come from different backgrounds but have a common spiritual philosophy that can be defined as godliness through the vital breath, a common bond that seems to bind them fast mentally and spiritually. They assemble in a common hall morning and evening for about half- an hour to indulge in a vital breath practice that consists in internalization of energy based on an ancient Indian technique known as brahma vidya. People have this common bond and a sense of oneness and understanding that is very appealing to a visitor. Now they live by farming their lands and consuming the produce and even have surplus to sell ,though the land they possess is not much. They have a medicinal garden for making medicines based on ayurvedic literature and which is high in demand outside for the quality and effectiveness. The farms are organically cultivated with minimum use of fertilizers of the chemical kind. The people are not very rigid about any isms, so to say.

In a modified format people in such a community can also go out to work availing common transport thus saving on fuel. They can also try out alternate energy modes through common effort and cooperation.

The children are groomed commonly without differentiation by the community as a whole and the entire community appears as self-contented, unassuming. Nature conserving, ethically conscious and environmentally aware without too much of a fuss about anything. They watch TV but are not much swayed by the advertisements, except for a very small minority. The others are satisfied with their life, surroundings and comforts or possessions or activities, without any lust or avarice, in spite of the fact that they mingle with the local community, not far away from city /town dwellings with a neighboring populace aiming at development ,growth and comforts as usually understood by the definition for good life.

The community in case has a more refined definition of good life consistent with ethical ,spiritual and common good values ,consistent with conservation and sustainability that comes from within and not externally enforced. There is altruism of an evolved kind, amidst sylvian peaceful environs with a steady community population that has not changed much in the past 50-60 years or so despite the fact that they do not adopt any modern birth-control methods. That is conservation and sustainability at its peak, a lesson to be studied, emulated and replicated appropriately. This community is near trivandrum (India).