Dear Reader,

A new scientific research note published by the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication last week finds that a large share of Indians are deeply concerned about climate impacts.

After surveying over 10,000 adults nationwide to understand how different groups perceive climate risks, researchers estimated that 58% of Indian adults aged 30–44 years are “very worried” that severe heat waves could harm their local area, and 58% of Indian women report similar levels of worry.

At the same time, a new United Nations report highlights an alarming global imbalance in environmental spending: in 2023, the world spent $7.3 trillion on activities that degrade nature — 33 times more than the roughly $220 billion invested in protecting and restoring it. Furthermore, just 32 fossil fuel companies were responsible for half of the global carbon dioxide emissions driving the climate crisis in 2024, a new Carbon Majors report shows. This includes Coal India, an entity owned by my country’s government.

These reports resonate deeply with me. Heat stress, landslides, floods, and other extreme weather events are increasingly linked to climate change, and now more than ever, there is a need to protect the planet for future generations. Reporting on climate change extensively for the past five years has only reinforced this sense of urgency.

I, too, live with a lot of climate anxiety. I often question whether individual efforts are a drop in the ocean: These major players appear to be operating with impunity, working at all costs to stall the systemic change necessary to address the climate crisis. It is a paradox I struggle with.

But beyond continuing to report on these companies as a journalist and holding myself to conscious choices, what real alternative do I have?

Climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe puts it best: “The most important thing you can do to fight climate change is to talk about it.”

I experienced this most recently in a small moment at a local textile shop: when I declined a plastic bag for a kurti set I had just purchased, the senior-citizen shop employee looked puzzled and said, “We don’t charge for the plastic bag.” When I explained that I was trying to cut down on plastic waste, she looked at me with clear confusion.

Yet, these conversations have been impactful. I have persuaded at least twenty women — cousins, colleagues, and friends — to switch from plastic-lined sanitary napkins to reusable menstrual cups. Many mothers I spoke to understood the need to use cotton, reusable diapers for their children once they learned that disposable diapers can take over 100 years to decompose.

In my neighbourhood, a small group of women now collects plastic bags and returns them to local grocery stores for reuse. 

In Chennai, India, where I live, there are hundreds of zero-waste practitioners who have trained not just themselves but their families and household staff to such an extent that not a single plastic wrapper enters their homes. Groceries are bought in steel containers, personal-care products are refilled rather than replaced, and food is ordered only from restaurants that use eco-friendly packaging. Kitchen waste is composted, clothes are sent to recycling facilities, and disposables are treated as a last resort. 

The Xylom is founded in Atlanta, the cradle of the Civil Rights Movement. Across continents, our ancestors accomplished more, with less, against worse. To end this newsletter, I quote Martin Luther King Jr., “We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.”

Warmly,
Laasya Shekhar
Managing Editor

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✨ NEWS BEHIND THE NEWS

• 🎤 On January 28th, I will be one of the panelists speaking on “Telling Urban Climate Stories: Pitching for Impact” as part of Media for Climate Action — a workshop on Urban Decarbonisation and Extreme Heat. The workshop is being conducted by a coalition of organisations, including Auroville Consulting, ASAR, Poovulagin Nanbargal, and the Cool Coalition.

• 🔈 Our advisory board member, Rhysea Agrawal, will be speaking at the Institute for Independent Journalists (IIJ) 2026 Freelance Journalism Conference, Solo Together, on March 5–6, 2026. Register here.

• 📢 ICYMI: Join our WhatsApp channel and help reach users who stay off social media (share this with your friends).

🍑 A SOUTHERN FLAIR

• ROSWELL, Ga. — Roswell mosque to build new eco-friendly 'living buildings'(Emily Jones, WABE/Grist)

  “It doesn’t quietly drain the city’s resources; it adds to them. Rather, it replenishes them,” says Imam Abdullah Jaber, who leads Roswell Community Masjid. “Most buildings, they take. This one gives back.” 

• NOTH CAROLINA — How North Carolina erased medical debt for 2.5 million people (Alex Olgin, NPR)

  “I'm excited for the people of North Carolina,” says Allison Sesso, CEO of Undue Medical Debt, a charity that uses donor money to buy and erase medical debt. “It pairs not just medical debt relief going backwards, but it fixes the upstream problems.”

🗺️ WHAT ELSE WE'RE READING

• MINNEAPOLIS — Man killed in Minneapolis by federal agents identified as VA nurse Alex Pretti: ‘He wanted to help people’ (Melody Schreiber, The Guardian)

  “He wanted to help people,” said Dimitri Drekonja, chief of infectious diseases at the VA hospital and professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota, who worked with [Alex J.] Pretti at the hospital and on a research project. “He was a super nice, super helpful guy – looked after his patients. I’m just stunned.”

• CENTRALIA, Pa. — The Rebirth of Pennsylvania’s Infamous Burning Town (Colin Dickey, Atlas Obscura)

  “Young white oaks and linden trees push their way through this cacophony of life. Everywhere that’s not asphalt is a riot of green in every possible shade. And all of this is possible, at least in part, because the state and federal governments have forbidden any new human settlement, giving the wild and the lush and untrammeled room to grow.”

• NEW DELHI — When America Breaks the Weather Machine, India Pays in Lives (David Sathuluri, The Quint)

  “India cannot build NCAR’s replacement overnight. The supercomputers cost billions; the expertise takes decades. The question is not whether science is alarming; it is whether we will let politics dismantle the tools that give us any chance to prepare.”

• Earth, Bound (Scott W. Stern, The Baffler)

  “It would be indefensible to claim that international environmental law has not accomplished anything—international pacts did, for instance, succeed in greatly reducing acid rain and saving the ozone layer — but it has undeniably failed to effect systemic change or, for that matter, stymie the increasing accumulation of global pollutants.

• Who will pay for global health? (Abdullahi Tsanni, Nature Health)

  “Sustainable domestic health financing will need a blended approach, including social health insurance schemes and raising funds from within countries, through sin taxes on products such as sugar, alcohol and tobacco,” says Vincent Okungu, a health economist at the University of Nairobi in Kenya.

SOME OF OUR RECENT CLIMATE STORIES

🤖 AI Promises Cleaner Farming in Tanzania — and the World. Now Comes the Real Test.

Plant pests are a major cause of crop losses across Africa. As a response, local researchers have leveraged AI to help smallholder farmers identify crop diseases, reduce pesticide use, and improve harvests. Can their efforts scale and survive political corruption? A dispatch from our Editor-at-Large Kang-Chun Cheng:

🌍 Black Fever, Brought to You by Climate Change

Black fever (visceral leishmaniasis) is a neglected tropical disease caused by the parasite Leishmania, with most cases occurring in Brazil, India and East Africa. Climate change — rising temperatures and unpredictable rainfall — is expanding the habitat and activity of disease vectors like sandflies, increasing the risk and spread of infections in rural India.

🍎 When “White Manure” Disappears From India's Himachal Region, So Do The Apple Trees

Apple orchards in Himachal Pradesh are struggling as warmer winters and reduced snowfall disrupt the natural chill and moisture the trees need to thrive. Climate change is also affecting pollination by bees and increasing pest and disease pressures, forcing farmers to rely more on managed beehives and chemical sprays.