COVID-19 Pandemic: Lockdown Impacts on the Indian Environment, Agriculture and Aquaculture

The COVID-19 pandemic is an extreme event. Lockdown in India, in a bid to slow down the pandemic, helped in reducing air pollution levels of major industrial cities (60–70%), due to significant improvement in the air quality index. This has also contributed in reducing global carbon emissions and greenhouse gas emissions. There has been a 40–50% improvement in the riverine water quality in terms of dissolved oxygen, biological oxygen demand, coliform bacteria levels and suspended particulate matter. These short-term environmental benefits may even pose larger threat to the environment during the post-lockdown ‘as usual scenario’. Due to lockdown, agriculture and aquaculture sectors have also been severely affected. Delayed harvesting in aquaculture negatively impacted the production cost, water productivity and footprint, total water use and water use efficiency. The COVID-19 crisis has shown the vulnerability of regional to global systems in protecting our health, environment and economy. Further, this pandemic has forced us to re-examine our relationship with nature for better association. Since COVID-19 has a possibility of becoming ‘just another endemic’, we must learn to live with this pandemic.