Promoting tribal communities and indigenous knowledge as potential solutions for the sustainable development of India

Anthropogenic alternations in the planetary bio-physical systems lead to climate change, and environmental degradation at the global, regional and national stratum. Nations world-wide recognise that learning from the indigenous knowledge of communities residing in harmony with nature can provide immense impetus to national conservation strategies and help research dedicated towards mitigation of climate change impacts. India, comprising of 8.6% tribal population, has access to an enormous aggregate of indigenous knowledge which through proper recognition, adoption and mainstreaming has the potential to provide sustainable solutions to concerns related to falling agricultural productivity and soil quality, biodiversity loss, water scarcity, pollution as well as many other social challenges. The present work therefore, attempts to collate the traditional practices of Indian tribes in these sectors as well as their socio-economic status with specific Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), targets and national indicators. For this, an in-depth analysis of available datasets related to the scheduled tribes of India was conducted and interpretations and extrapolations were done accordingly. Bubble plot analysis was performed to understand the relationship between poverty and education among the tribal communities of various Indian States. The results indicate that establishment of functional links between traditional practices and SDG 2, 6 and 15 in particular would significantly aid the climate action policy of India. Simultaneously, improvement in the income, women and child health and education of these communities through dedicated interventions would directly have a positive effect on national indicators of SDG 1, 2, 3, and 4. Besides, effectual policy interventions directed towards tribal welfare would greatly reduce the damaging effects of climate change in the long term.