NPTEL Environment and Development Week 1 And 2 Assignment Answers 2024
1. In 1987, the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED), which had been set up in 1983, published a report entitled ____ that came to be known as the Brundtland Report.
Options:
- Our Common Future
- Our Common Past
- Our Common Wealth
- Our Common Agenda
✅ Answer: Our Common Future
Explanation: “Our Common Future” is the official title of the Brundtland Report, which introduced and popularized the concept of sustainable development.
2. The concept ‘sustainable development’ was described by the 1987 Brundtland Commission Report as:
Options:
- Development that meets the needs of the present
- Development that meets the needs of the individual
- Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs
- Development that meets the needs of the past
✅ Answer: Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs
Explanation: This is the widely accepted definition of sustainable development, coined in the Brundtland Report.
3. Ecology refers to:
Options:
- The interrelations of human beings and animals
- The interrelations of human beings and machine
- The interrelations of flora and fauna
- The interrelations of human beings, flora, and fauna with elements of the natural and the physical environment—biotic and non-biotic components
✅ Answer: The interrelations of human beings, flora, and fauna with elements of the natural and the physical environment—biotic and non-biotic components
Explanation: Ecology is the study of interactions between living organisms (biotic) and their non-living (abiotic) environment.
4. Which of the following statement is true about ‘development’?
Options:
- It is a process that creates growth
- It is a process that creates growth progress
- It is a process that creates the addition of physical, economic, environmental, social and demographic components
- All of these
✅ Answer: All of these
Explanation: Development is multi-dimensional, encompassing growth, progress, and integration of several components like economic, social, and environmental factors.
5. Animate world involves:
Options:
- Objects, machines, and the physical world around us
- Plants and animals including humans
- Only flora
- Only fauna
✅ Answer: Plants and animals including humans
Explanation: The animate world refers to living beings, including plants (flora) and animals (fauna).
6. ______________ refers to a relative balance of nutrient cycles, energy flows, and species and composition in ecosystems.
Options:
- Ecosystem homeostatic
- Ecosystem heterostatic
- Ecosystem homeostasis
- Ecosystem heterostasis
✅ Answer: Ecosystem homeostasis
Explanation: Homeostasis in ecology means the stable balance in the functioning of an ecosystem.
7. In exponential population growth, growth rate is _____________ to the population size or number.
Options:
- Directly proportional
- Indirectly proportional
- Inversely proportional
- None of these
✅ Answer: Directly proportional
Explanation: In exponential growth, the growth rate increases as the population increases, hence directly proportional.
8. The complete form of S-shaped growth curve is:
Options:
- Solo growth curve
- Singular growth curve
- Symbiotic growth curve
- Sigmoid growth curve
✅ Answer: Sigmoid growth curve
Explanation: The Sigmoid (S-shaped) curve shows slow growth initially, followed by rapid growth, and then stabilization due to environmental limits.
9. In which city was the Earth Summit organized?
Options:
- Paris, France
- Doha, Qatar
- Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- Kyoto, Japan
✅ Answer: Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Explanation: The 1992 Earth Summit (also known as the Rio Summit) was held in Rio de Janeiro and was pivotal for global sustainable development discussions.
10. Which of the following objective is not part of the UK’s Sustainable Development Strategy published in May 1999?
Options:
- Technological progress which recognizes the needs of everyone
- Effective protection of the environment
- Prudent use of natural resources
- Maintenance of high and stable levels of economic growth & employment
✅ Answer: Technological progress which recognizes the needs of everyone
Explanation: While important, technological progress was not explicitly listed as one of the four key objectives in the UK’s 1999 strategy. The other three were clearly stated.
NPTEL Environment and Development Week 2 Assignment Answers
1. Prior to the 1960s, environmentalism focused on ______________ and conservation of resources.
Options:
- Preservation of culture
- Preservation of wilderness
- Preservation of food
- Preservation of water
✅ Answer: Preservation of wilderness
Explanation: Early environmentalism before the 1960s primarily focused on preserving natural wilderness areas and conserving resources, often driven by movements to protect national parks and forests.
2. The book Silent Spring published in 1962, sparked the beginning of:
Options:
- Liberal environmentalism
- Radical environmentalism
- Modern environmentalism
- Traditional environmentalism
✅ Answer: Modern environmentalism
Explanation: Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962) exposed the harmful effects of pesticides like DDT, marking the start of modern environmentalism by raising awareness of pollution and ecological health.
3. ______________ claims that living things other than humans, and the natural environment as a whole, are deserving of consideration in reasoning about the morality of political, economic, and social policies.
Options:
- Materialism
- Environmentalism
- Idealism
- Utilitarianism
✅ Answer: Environmentalism
Explanation: Environmentalism advocates for the protection of the natural world and recognizes that non-human life and ecosystems have value in moral and policy decisions.
4. ______________ focuses mainly on the negative effects that environmental degradation has on human beings and their interests, including their interests in health, recreation, and quality of life.
Options:
- Biocentrism
- Environmentalism
- Anthropocentrism
- Ecofeminism
✅ Answer: Anthropocentrism
Explanation: Anthropocentrism places humans at the center of concern and evaluates environmental issues based on their impact on human well-being.
5. _____________ claims that nature has an intrinsic moral worth that does not depend on its usefulness to human beings, and it is this intrinsic worth that gives rise directly to obligations to the environment.
Options:
- Biocentrism
- Environmentalism
- Anthropocentrism
- Realism
✅ Answer: Biocentrism
Explanation: Biocentrism argues that all living beings have moral value regardless of human interest, and thus deserve ethical consideration.
6. Who authored the book Economics of the Coming Spaceship Earth (1966)?
Options:
- Rachel Carson
- Kenneth E. Boulding
- Paul Ehrlich
- None of these
✅ Answer: Kenneth E. Boulding
Explanation: Kenneth E. Boulding introduced the “Spaceship Earth” concept, stressing the need to view Earth as a closed system with finite resources.
7. In which year was the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) established?
Options:
- 1963
- 1968
- 1988
- 1973
✅ Answer: 1988
Explanation: The IPCC was established in 1988 by the UNEP and WMO to assess climate change science and provide global reports like AR6.
8. The term ‘ecological refugees’ refers to:
Options:
- Unemployed people who eke out a living in the cities on the leavings of omnivores prosperity
- Displaced people who eke out a living in the cities on the leavings of omnivores prosperity
- None of these
- Peasants-turned-slum dwellers who eke out a living in the cities on the leavings of omnivores prosperity
✅ Answer: Peasants-turned-slum dwellers who eke out a living in the cities on the leavings of omnivores prosperity
Explanation: Ecological refugees are people forced to migrate due to environmental degradation, like desertification, deforestation, or pollution.
9. In which year did the Bhopal disaster, also referred to as the ‘Bhopal gas tragedy’, occur?
Options:
- 1996
- 1984
- 1981
- 2003
✅ Answer: 1984
Explanation: The Bhopal Gas Tragedy occurred in December 1984 due to a leak of methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas from the Union Carbide plant in India.
10. The complete form of NEPA (1969) is:
Options:
- The National Employment Policy Act
- The National Environmental Policy Act
- The National Education Policy Act
- None of these
✅ Answer: The National Environmental Policy Act
Explanation: The NEPA (1969, USA) requires federal agencies to assess the environmental effects of their proposed actions before making decisions.