This study finds its premise in the concept of climate justice, that as described by the UN, is an ethical principle that seeks to acknowledge and address the disproportionate implications of climate change on vulnerable communities. Despite being one of the world’s only three carbon negative countries, Bhutan faces disproportionate, often existential impacts of climate change that include, but are not limited to the intersectionality of environmental, economic and cultural domains, particularly considering the country’s reliance on climate-sensitive sectors like agriculture, hydropower, and tourism. This stress is further amplified by the contrast in climatic conditions of Northern Indian planes with higher precipitation and Tibet’s dry, continental highlands, making the Himalayas a fragile, eco-sensitive zone for species in the landscape (Penjor et.al, 2021; Katel et al., 2024).
In times like now, where collective rights are recognized as the third generation of human rights, it becomes increasingly imperative to identify the impacts of climate change to design adaptation strategies. However, the lack of access to baseline bioclimatic data at an appropriate spatial and temporal scale would impede possibilities of observation, prediction, and consequent action. This is where the HEROES – the ‘Himalayan Environmental Rhythms Observation and Evaluation System’ intervenes.
Here, climate change is identified by longitudinally monitoring the life cycles of plants given that phenology, otherwise known as the ‘nature calendar’, is one of its strongest biological indicators (Liang, 2019). Implemented and managed by the Ugyen Wangchuck Institute for Conservation and Environmental Research (UWICER) since 2015, HEROES operates as a citizen science initiative aimed at not only monitoring climate variability and its impact on the terrestrial ecosystem of Bhutan, but also engaging and training students as the next generation of scientists and researchers in the process by integrating a 20 school network that act as weather and observation stations, with an elevation range of between 200m to 3,030m. In addition, students also manage the automatic weather station that logs data every 10 minutes. (HEROES, n.d).
The scale of their operations dated 21/08/26 on their webpage includes 2.8 observations across 110 plant species and the creation of a yearly climate and phenology data where data from 17 schools is made public whilst training over 400 students annually (HEROES, n.d). In addition to their open-source datasets that can be used by researchers, students, and other interested individuals, they organize workshops, seminars, and lectures as part of their initiatives. This convergent, citizen-centric and scientific approach presents an interesting challenge to traditionally top-down technocratic approaches to climate solutions, integrating the ideas of strategic urbanism as described by Chu et al., (2017).
During challenging situations such as these, it becomes integral for people to acknowledge and channelize their agency both as individuals, and as a collective in claiming their rights. Initiatives like these not only promote national interest in scaling capabilities but also engage citizens in ways that make them aware of their responsibilities, paving way for further consequential interventions.
Such initiatives must inspire further action-oriented approaches, specially in countries like India, where biodiversity becomes significant to discourse on the rights of tribal and other aboriginal communities that are grossly underrepresented in governance and developmental platforms. Organizations like the Indian Institute of Bio-Social Research and Development conduct action research linking traditional tribal wisdom on forest blooms, fruiting, and seasonal changes with the Biological Diversity Act to track ecological shifts (IBRAD, n,d).
In this regard, there has been mushrooming of citizen science initiatives in India as well. SeasonWatch, for example, was a project that began in Kerala (2010) and has now branched out with school and individual level program partnerships. These are two that stood out to me – (a) The State Council for Scientific Technology and Environment, Meghalaya, aims to popularize science in the state among the youth. SCSTE introduces several activity-based science learning activities, including SeasonWatch, in the school eco-clubs, through a wide network of interns and volunteers and (b) the Andaman and Nicobar Environment Team that observes 5 species of culturally important plants every week and shares their experiences with children (SeasonWatch, n.d).
While there surely has been progress, the question of what is observed and what is ignored is key in asymmetric societies like India. The observable is what creates a concept of what is actionable, making data central to the very acknowledgement of a problem. The stories of initiatives like HEROES, IBRAD, and SeasonWatch all ask the same questions – whose knowledge is knowledge, and whose problems are problems?
About the author
Samraksha Mukund is a student of the Department of International Studies, Political Science, and History at CHRIST (Deemed to be University), Bangalore.
