Sacred Groves and Environmental Conservation: A Geo-Religious Study

Tushar Jain

Independent Researcher

Delhi, India

Abstract
Sacred groves—remnant patches of native vegetation conserved for religious and cultural purposes—represent an enduring fusion of spirituality and ecology that has persisted across diverse societies for millennia. These living sanctuaries, often dedicated to deities, spirits, or ancestral worship, embody a complex interplay of ritual norms, communal identity, and ecological stewardship that yields remarkable conservation benefits. This enhanced geo-religious study deepens our understanding of how sacred groves function as de facto protected areas by examining both their spatial distributions and the socio-religious mechanisms that sustain them. Building upon remote-sensing mapping and GIS analyses, the study delineates grove clusters in five biogeographically distinct regions—India’s Western Ghats, Nigeria’s Yoruba lands, Greece’s Eastern Mediterranean, Bangladesh’s Sundarbans periphery, and Hawaii’s Kona districts—and assesses their resilience against land-use change. Concurrently, intensive biodiversity surveys document floristic and structural metrics—species richness, Shannon diversity indices, canopy complexity—within groves and adjacent control forests. Semi-structured interviews with shrine custodians, priests, and community elders elucidate the ritual calendars, taboo enforcement, and local governance models underpinning grove protection. Statistical correlations between ritual frequency and ecological indicators reveal that groves with vibrant, regularly practiced ceremonies maintain significantly higher biodiversity and structural integrity than those where traditional norms have weakened. Ethnographic insights further highlight adaptive governance variants—priest-led, council-based, and hybrid models—each with distinct strengths in addressing modern threats such as invasive species, tourism pressures, and urban expansion. By integrating quantitative ecological data with qualitative cultural analysis, this manuscript substantiates the hypothesis that spiritual beliefs can serve as powerful drivers of landscape-level conservation.

Keywords
Sacred Groves, Environmental Conservation, Biodiversity, Geo-Religious Study, Traditional Ecological Knowledge

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