Years ago, as a Masters student of Life Sciences, I entered a busy lab filled with all state of art equipments & PhD. thesis piled up the shelves. The researchers were pouring into various analytical flasks & peeping into automated microscopes. The smell of agar & media was the first fragrance of research I got. Each lab mate was so engrossed in their tiny little specimens that the noise of the rotary shaker & the vibration of the old incubator were completely oblivious to them. This lab environment took my anxiety levels higher up, as I was more than excited for meeting a Scientist G in the next lab room.
As a kid, when I was interviewed for a children TV show, I had a dream to be scientist. I revered an image of a national scientist who made grand innovations & applications which built the future of India. As a kid, I often sketched out a man with a lab coat & bespectacled till the nose with few test tubes on the desk & smoke fumes coming out of a flask. So, now grown up, moving into the next lab room to meet a Scientist G was a big deal for me.
As, I entered the next lab I saw an old man sitting on a cane chair, in simple humble clothes and completely buried into his old desktop & between a heap of research papers & hard bound thesis. As I overcame the cordiality of interacting with a renowned scientist, he asked me what I would like to work upon. As couple of days passed by, I was lucky to get direct conversations with him & his way of orientation towards research & academia. He asked me a simple question of what to do you foresee in the next 20 years for research required in India. I did not have an impromptu answer, I so requested for some time & during that read a lot on what all flashed across my mind at that stage. He then oriented me to think what could be the issues in land, food & agriculture 20 years down the line. His orientation was towards how biological pesticides would be of importance in solving those issues. No sooner, through his mentoring I realized that, this was his humble way of orienting me towards a career I like and also comprehending its importance. I was lucky to work under such a scientist mentor who could build a thought provoking ability towards a career goal in life. It brought the importance of basic science towards applied science. It today helps me, encounter the gap between research, academia & market in my daily routine as an ecopreneur.
Today, when I often try to bring in lab jargon towards common citizens dealing with solid waste management & composting techniques, this very thought provoking ability becomes a handy tool to understand what could be the future of nature … say 20 years down the lane. The journey of lab to market for any product or innovation starts with lot of scientific jargon but eventually has to answer the humble questions of market which could be as simple & robust as weight, smell, religion & money! The entire lab jargon of automation & innovation goes for a full toss while trying to convince the person across the table who is least concerned about his own future, leaving aside nature!
That’s when I realize this huge gap of us humans in understanding the future of nature! It is a phrase which needs to be thought upon with the same importance we see the financial investments for our kids or the loans we take in to have a safe roof for the fag end of our life.
At a time when the global economy is growing and the poverty rate is the lowest in recorded history, it would be easy to become complacent and overlook looming challenges of natural disasters. Talks are critical on the topic of future of nature, until we hear the cries of our beloved, deep down in the tsunami, floods or earthquakes!
When we consider the scope of the challenge to prepare for the future of nature, it is important to understand that many children currently in primary school will work in a land where trees are in small terrarium bottles & breathing air in cylinders.
No matter who we are, or what we work for, it is not going to happen if can’t breathe the air and drink the water. It’s high time we orient our human minds towards this thought!
~ Prachi Nimkar
