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 The liberation of society and nature from the growth imperative is possible only when intergeneratiuonal equity is established by subjugating private interests to
that of the community. We believe that indigenous ecological ethic contains the seed of
subversion of the hegemony of developmentality.
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Organisational StructureAlthough CIS started its journey in 1993, it was registered in December 2004 as a Trust Organisation, with ecologist Dr. Debal Deb as its Founder-Chair, designer and entrepreneur Mr. Debashis Chatterjee as Secretary, chemist Mr. Partha Majumdar, and environmental engineer and consultant Mr. Sanjay Srivastava as Executive Members. The trustees have a long track record of active involvement in environmental protection and in various civic movements for biodiversity conservation and social justice. They share a vision of building a more socially just society, and are comitted to conducting honest scientific research, documentation, awareness campaign, and policy advocacy for protecting the biological and cultural heritage of the country, resist developmentality, and promote sustainable living. The composition of the Board of Trustees is permanent - barring death or disability of members, who are accountable for all activities of CIS. CIS has not yet received any external financial support from any funding agency. All of its activities are fueled by contributions from its founder-members and donations from friends. In 1998, CIS, as a partner of Research Foundation for Science, Technology & Ecology (RFSTE), New Delhi, established Vrihi, a folk rice gene bank -- the first in eastern India. Vrihi distributes folk crop variety seeds among farmers to promote in situ conservation of rare crop varieties. CIS has its research station and demonstration farm Basudha at Binodbati village in Bankura district. Basudha has a farm house built on ecological architectural principles, using cheap indigenous building materials. It has a small arboreum of indigenous trees, and demonstrates the sustainable benefits of alternative energy use, rainwater harvesting as well as traditional ecological farming practices. Basudha participates in local cultural life, and organizes annual tournaments of traditional sports and folk musical programs. CIS engages a small, but effective, number of eminent experts in different disciplines of science, humanities and law in advocacy campaigns to influence national policies in biodiversity conservation and indigenous people's rights. CIS periodically conducts public seminars and workshops on conservation of biodiversity, including crop genetic diversity, community forest management, biopiracy and intellectual property rights of the indigenous people, and farmers' rights. CIS is a member of the National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan (NBSAP) of India's Ministry of Environment and Forest. CIS works in collaboration with different NGOs in the fields of people's innovations, conservation of species and habitats, research in ecoforestry, and campaign against bio-piracy and commercial release of untested genetically modified organisms. |