India's double standards in the climate change debate | N.R.Mohanty

Published on 13-12-2007 In National

Viewed 1194 times

India's double standards in the climate change debate

Do the developing countries like India have any responsibility towards the threat looming over the earth with regard to the climate change? The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Report suggested that the developed nations (36 as per the account of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) should reduce their greenhouse gas emission by 80 per cent whereas the corresponding target for the developing nations should be set at 20 per cent.

While releasing the report in India, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, the deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, rubbished the report on the ground that it was iniquitous. In an interview with Shekhar Gupta, the editor-in-chief of the Indian Express (published on December 3) he justified his anger in the following words: "If you look at the United States, the carbon emission per capita in tonnes of carbon dioxide is roughly 20. In Europe, it is about 12, in China about four, and India about one. Take the average of the United States and Europe as, say, 15. If they reduce that by 80 per cent, they will be at three, assuming population remains the same. If we reduce by 20 per cent, we will be 0.8 tonnes per capita…My point was that it cannot be fair that you are projecting a reduction that leaves us on a per capita basis much below the rest of the world."

Then what is his prescription? "Everyone in the world should have an equal carbon footprint. Pollution per person should be equalized," as the headline in the Express interview screamed. Well, the principle that he espouses is just and fair. However the question to be asked is, is this principle good only as far as the international agreement is concerned or could the same principle be upheld at the domestic level? If asked, then Ahluwalia's double-standards would have come out in the open.

Alhuwalia is right that the developed, industrialized and rich countries which have polluted the environment for hundreds of years (ever since the industrial revolution), must bear the brunt of the responsibility for offsetting the adverse effects of the global warming. As India is a developing country and its industrial economy is at a take-off stage, it will be unfair for India to be forced to compromise its economic growth to bring down the pollution level.

What is India's (and for that matter, China's) governing response to the climate change crisis? Those who have contributed the most to the pollution level in the past must be made to pay the price in the present. And those who are contributing in a large measure to the pollution now must be allowed to go scot free, till they reach the pollution standard of the West!

And what is the basic yardstick adopted by India and China (it is one of the rare issues on which both the countries have come together) to measure the polluting index of each country? As Ahluwalia echoes, the per capita emission is the obvious standard for them, as that is the only way to nail down a broad swathe of developed countries as climate culprits. But if we take into consideration the totality of the pollution at the country level, then of the developed countries,
only the United States can be hauled up as the prime accused; the two most populous countries of the world -- China and India -- which are developing countries-- are currently the biggest polluters along with the USA.

That is why, for India (and for China), per capita emission is the guiding principle to raise the issue of equity and justice.

And what are the remedial measures? One,'polluter pays' principle. Those who pollute more, pay more. But that could act as a deterrent only if bigger polluters are made to pay disproportionately large amount to pinch them.

Otherwise, the rich will pay and be not bothered about the climate change. After all, there is a differentiated unit price structure as regards the consumption of the electricity is concerned, even in India. After a certain level (depending on the city), the cost per unit consumption of power goes up from 20 to 100 per cent. But that has not deterred the moneyed class from increasing power consumption at their commercial and residential establishments.

Since the carbon-free power constitutes only a fraction what is consumed globally, the most challenging task is to goad the polluters to consume less power (much of which is coal-fired and carbon-saturated) and emit less pollution. But goading, without the threat of severe penalty for violation, is often not very effective.

But who will impose the penalty on the violators? Since we live in a sovereign nation-state system, where multinational agreements tend to become prescriptive rather than mandatory (in the absence of any mechanism with the UN to coerce the countries to adhere to the agreed principles), the burden lies on the nation-states themselves.

But how can the nation-states act in this regard when the rich and the powerful are the biggest polluters and the rulers are dependent on them for their survival? After all, Al Gore, who has become the biggest individual evangelist in the carbon-reduction campaign, for which he has won an Oscar (for best documentary) and Nobel prize (for peace), was the vice president of the United States of America when the Kyoto Protocol was formalised; it was made mandatory for the developed countries to cut down emission level. But the US, along with Australia, refused to ratify the Protocol on the ground that mandatory provisions were not acceptable.

Clearly, Al Gore, in office, was at the mercy of the oil and the industrial lobby, and could not go against their interest. That is why, only when he was out of office that he went ahead with his environmental activism.

At least, the US government was candid that it could not go against the interest of the rich and powerful sections in the country. But the European countries were duplicitous in their approach. They ratified the Kyoto Protocol but they had no political will to go against the interests of the rich industrial class. That is why, the European emission level has gone up manifold instead of coming down, as mandated by the Protocol that they agreed to.

The Indian case is no different. India is a votary of the Kyoto Protocol as it does not mandate any cut down on its emission level. But it is shying away from implementing at the domestic level the same principle that it is espousing at the international level -- the per capita emission as the standard. If India's per capita emission of carbon dioxide is one tonne, then anyone emitting more than one tonne of pollutant must be asked to compensate adequately and a carbon credit mechanism must be created so that the money accrued out of this compensation is allocated to the poor who contribute very little to the pollution level.

That way, India's economic growth will not be impeded. At the same time, certain degree of carbon equity and justice will be ensured within the Indian population. But India's rulers, Montek Singh Ahluwalia and his mentor, Manmohan Singh, are so much under the influence of the industrial and corporate sharks of this country that they cannot afford to go against them.

That would explain Montek Singh Ahluwalia's double standards: Everyone in the world should have an equal carbon footprint. But everyone in India cannot have an equal carbon footprint.

0 Comments

Blog

Print