India’s cities are on a breakneck path to growth. Cities are engines of prosperity and promise, as well as zones of pollution, stress, and disease. Episodes of flood, drought, heat waves, and smog tell us why we must begin to think ecologically about our urban future in Indian cities. Many Indian cities were built on a foundation of local ecology, drawing on the rivers, lakes, forests, grasslands and coastal areas around them for food, water and building material. Yet over centuries the human population has grown and transformed the ecology of our cities beyond recognition. This talk will discuss how we need to learn from our past urban history, to re-design cities to accommodate ecology, ensuring human wellbeing as well as resilience to climate change.
About the speaker
Harini Nagendra is a Professor in Sustainability at Azim Premji University. She has conducted research for over 30 years on India’s forests and cities. In addition to a number of research publications, she writes a monthly Sunday column in the Deccan Herald ‘The Green Goblin’, and is a well known public speaker and writer science issues in newspapers, blogs and other fora. Her books include “Nature in the City: Bengaluru in the Past, Present and Future” (Oxford University Press, 2016) and “Cities and Canopies: The Tree Book of Indian Cities” (Penguin, 2019).
