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ENVIRONMENT: India Warms Up to Copenhagen
Analysis by Neeta Lal
NEW DELHI, Oct 5, 2009 (IPS) - With the clock ticking away on the United Nations Framework for Climate
Change Committee (UNFCCC) summit in Copenhagen in December, the
fractiousness between the developed and the developing nations on who ought
to do more to control climate change is getting increasingly strident.
With 190 nations poised to forge a momentous agreement to replace the
1997 Kyoto Protocol -- an international environment treaty that establishes
legally binding commitment for the reduction of greenhouse gases (GHGs) –
there is still no unanimity on how to spread out GHG emission curbs. The
amount of financial support and clean technology rich nations should transfer
to the poorer ones to help them cope with the cataclysmic effects of rising
temperatures is also nebulous.
The urgency to save the planet is lost on no one. Science has proven beyond
doubt that the ramifications of rising global temperatures can greatly imperil
life on earth. The world needs to keep emissions levels pegged low to help
push the planet off the precipice of global warming. Rainfall patterns and
agricultural activity -- already hostage to nature’s caprices – are getting
seriously impacted, hitting millions of farmers around the world to further
diminish the world’s already shrinking granaries.
India -- a prominent player of the Group of 77 countries that have a common
negotiating plank – has based its climate change stand on two clear
principles.
First, that the current stock of GHGs in the atmosphere is the cumulative
result of emissions over 150 to 200 years for which the developed nations are
entirely responsible. It is only fair, therefore, that the major emission cuts
should also come from them.
Second, the UNFCCC outlines the principle of equity, according to which every
individual in the world should have equal share of total emissions. India’s
argument is that since its annual per capita emissions are way below the
world average (1.9 tons), eclipsed by China’s 3.9 tons and the United States’s
24.3 tons, why should it be pressured further to whittle down its emissions?
However, if the developed world expects India to sign on to a carbon-
reduction plan, it is only fair that the latter pays for it in terms of cash and
technology transfer. Even the UNFCCC acknowledges the primary
responsibility of developed countries in triggering global warming. It notes
further that the developing countries have to first address poverty eradication
through economic development, and rich nations ought to assist developing
ones with their mitigation efforts through both financial compensation and
technology transfer.
Already, nearly half of India’s 1.3 billion populace lives in villages with no
access to commercial electricity. This helps keeps tabs – albeit indirectly --
on its emissions. In addition, more than half the Indians subsist frugally on
less than a dollar a day, which is quite the antithesis of a Westerner’s
consumptive lifestyle.
Despite this, pressure is ratcheting up on developing economies like India to
agree to a time-bound and mandatory emissions reduction protocol. This
point was also driven home by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on her
India visit in July.
This prompted India’s Minister for Environment and Forests, Jairam Ramesh,
to state that India cannot let its environmental agenda obfuscate its growth
and development. The problem, asserted the minister, has been created by
the carbon profligacy of developed countries, and so India’s right to
economic development cannot be imperiled by emissions caps designed to
make up for Western progress.
Recently, the minister reiterated India’s stand yet again in a strongly worded
message by stating "India will walk out of the Copenhagen talks if the
Western nations insist on enforcing any kind of legal bindings on its emission
trajectory".
At the same time, lest India be seen as intransigent on the matter, Ramesh
has asserted that India is already well aware of its global environmental
responsibility. "For us," said the minister, "GDP doesn’t mean Gross Domestic
Product but Green Domestic Product. Unless we think of green economic
growth, our growth will not be sustainable."
The United States, under the Obama administration, is perceived to be willing
to sign an agreement that puts restrictions on carbon emissions. As a
reaction, India has already asserted that it would be "most unfortunate" if
countries like the U.S. decided to place border adjustment taxes on goods
produced under less stringent emissions regulations.
Therefore, in a clever move, the Western nations have now swiveled the
spotlight on India and China as the key players, whose agreement, or lack of
it, will "make or break" the Copenhagen deal. In other words, if Copenhagen
fails, we all know who to blame.
But India’s perceived recalcitrance notwithstanding, its government has
engaged significantly with climate change through a prime ministerial
directive called the National Action Plan (NAP) on Climate Change released
last year. It has also funded adaptation efforts such as economic support for
small farmers to switch to growing crops suited to warmer temperatures all
over the country. Overall, the government intends to spend two percent of its
current GDP on tackling climate change.
Inarguably, the Indian focus – hitherto skewed more on "adaptation" rather
than mitigation of the effects of climate change – will now firmly be on how
to counter the challenges of environmental degradation and changing crop
patterns.
The official approach is also being recalibrated towards proactive mitigation
measures that would reduce the country’s dependence on conventional fossil
fuel and oil imports to shift towards alternative clean energy solutions.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has said that the government also proposes
to set up a national climate change mitigation authority (NCCMA). This body
will assign and monitor green targets to be achieved by the year 2020
towards reducing India's greenhouse gas emissions. The NCCMA's guidelines
would complement NAP’s.
The NAP earmarks eight areas or "missions" for focused energy and climate
policy interventions: solar energy, energy efficiency, sustainable habitat,
water, Himalayan ecosystems, sustainable agriculture, strategic knowledge
for climate change and a "Green India". It also calls for boosting solar power
production; reforestation so that a third of the country is forested, up from
23 per cent; providing financial incentives for energy efficiency; research on
glacier melt; and development of sustainable agriculture.
The Indian government’s other steps to control climate change include
grassroots measures like increasing energy efficiency at the level of individual
consumers, including a major drive to popularise energy-efficient compact
fluorescent lamps in households. The government hopes to increase sales of
these bulbs by making them available for less than the market price, using
the sale of carbon credits to fund this subsidy.
It is due to its renewed commitment to combat climate change that India has
moved from being a bit player at erstwhile global climate change summits to
wrest centre stage. Ed Miliband, Britain’s Climate Change Secretary, estimates
that rather than a "deal breaker," India will be a "potential deal maker" at
Copenhagen. This indeed augurs well for the country, bolstering its
negotiating profile to make its voice count at perhaps one of this century’s
most important summits.
(END)
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