Launch of the study by Dr A P J Abdul Kalam, Hon'ble President of India on 6 February 2003 during the inauguration of DSDS 2003 at Vigyan Bhavan

Past forward

In 1997, TERI undertook a major study called the GREEN India 2047 (Growth with Resource Enhancement of Environment and Nature 2047). The object of this exercise was to determine and quantify the extent of damage to India’s natural resource base that accompanied economic growth in the 1947–97 period (Box 1). The results of this study were documented in a publication entitled Looking Back to Think Ahead. This ‘looking back’ provided the foundation of the ‘think ahead’ component of the study entitled DISHA (Directions, Innovations, and Strategies for Harnessing Action), which envisaged alternative development options before us such that we may adopt strategies that lead us into a more sustainable future. The publication entitled DISHA for sustainable development presented ‘business-as-usual’ and ‘alternative’ policy scenarios for the period 1997–2047 and developed quantitative projections for the state of our natural resources and the environment under the influence of such policies (Box 2).

Review renewed

The results of the first component of the GREEN India 2047 study, covering the 50 years since our Independence, were presented in 1997. Since then the Ninth Five-Year Plan period has gone by with its overarching goal being ‘Growth with Social Justice and Equity’. The Plan period has seen, in India as also internationally, a better understanding of the interdependent economic, social, and environmental facets of sustainability, an understanding that echoes in the Approach Paper to the Tenth Five-Year Plan. The period culminated in the Rio + 10 Summit, where countries reiterated their resolve to sustainable development. Have understanding and resolve translated into concrete action? Have natural resource management and sustainable development been accorded priority in the recent past to ensure reversal of adverse trends?

TERI felt that it was necessary to carry out a detailed analysis of the developments and their impacts during the last five years. The proposed study, entitled GREEN India 2047 Renewed: looking back to change track, seeks answers to the following questions.

What were the main trends in India in the last five years (1997–2002) with respect to the use of natural resources and the state of the environment?
How do these compare with the sustainability scenarios outlined in DISHA, both in terms of policy initiatives and trends in natural resource use and the environment?
What is the magnitude of the ‘hidden costs’ of development over the last five years?
Should DISHA projections be revised in the light of recent trends?

In seeking answers to these questions, the GREEN India 2047 Renewed: looking back to change track study will engage the wisdom of various stakeholders.

Government

The government is the primary facilitator of change. That the Indian government is cognizant of the challenges ahead is reflected in the Approach Paper to the Tenth Five-Year Plan, which sets several economic, social, and environmental goals, being guided overall by the objective of ‘broad-based development, which meets the objectives of equity and sustainability’.

The significance of looking back to think ahead is given due recognition in the approach document where it says ‘…there are alarming gaps in our social attainments even after five decades of planning. To meet this challenge squarely, the Tenth Plan must learn from past experience. It must strengthen what has worked well, but it must also avoid repeating past failures…’ A stock taking of the 1997–2002 period will thus serve an important tool for policy-makers in gauging the progress made in the Ninth Plan period.

Corporate sector

Industry has a great stake in sustaining development stemming from it command over financial and technological resources as well as the implications of unsustainable growth. Refusal of the permission to expand or even orders of closure for failing to comply with increasingly stringent environmental regulations, vulnerability to competition that has the advantages of cleaner and more efficient technology, and crippling shortages of natural resource inputs are just a few of the consequences for the industry of a degraded environment.

Civil society

Ultimately, civil society holds the largest stake in sustaining development, as it bears the heaviest cost of unsustainable development.

Already, due to rising congestion and pollution, the quality of life in some Indian cities is poorer today than it was 20 years ago despite a large increase in per capita incomes. Environmental degradation has a disproportionate impact upon the underprivileged (who depend greatly on non-purchased natural resources) and is against all notions of distributive justice. In rural India, the collapse of the environmental base – especially forests – has undermined traditional livelihoods and forced a large proportion of the workforce into migration, adding to urban poverty.

Box 2 DISHA 2047: thinking ahead...

The GREEN India 2047 study illustrated the shocking state of progressive degradation of natural resources and warned that unless an alternative developmental path is charted, the country would be overcome by crises emanating from impoverishment of natural resources, social discontent, and eventually economic breakdown. The ‘alternative’ scenario envisaged in DISHA was built on a reform agenda that is more widespread than the ‘base’ scenario and is implemented at a considerably quicker pace. The alternative case identifies a number of stakeholders to implement the proposed interventions—ministries of the central and state governments, central and state government entities (e.g. railways, municipalities, irrigation and forestry departments), the corporate sector, industry associations, financial institutions, research organizations, NGOs, the farming community, and the public. However, the greatest responsibility of this change rests with the central and state governments. The success of DISHA will depend on their designing and implementing consistent policies, eschewing populism, introducing market-based reforms, giving government entities operational and financial freedom, empowering the people, ensuring full literacy within a generation and most important, displaying and maintaining the necessary political will to make all this happen. The likely benefits in terms of use and pollution of natural resources that will follow the alternative case vis-à-vis the base case in 1947 are listed below. Over 50% reduction in the use of coal, the reduction being entirely in imports Oil demand lower by over 35% than in the base case, driven mainly by a 60% drop in the transport sector’s demand for oil Doubling in power generation based on renewable energy technologies (This would imply a saving of 72 million tonnes of domestic coal and preventing 1 million tonne of SPM [suspended particulate matter] emissions, 22 million tonnes of fly ash, and 122 million tonnes of CO2.) Decline in air pollution (SPM) by a sharp 81% Reduction in water demand by 25% Increase in forestland to 92 million hectares (30% of the total area in the country), an 18% improvement over the base case, with a substantial increase in dense forests and reduction in open forests and forest areas under scrub.

One of the important features of the study will be the active involvement of all these stakeholders through workshops and dissemination events. These will include (1) a national-level workshop, to engage a wide range of stakeholders and to draw attention to sustainability issues at the highest level, and (2) thematic workshops to provide focused issue-based or region-specific analysis both in terms of trends and impacts as well as policy prescriptions.

It is our endeavour to formalize these five-yearly reviews to mainstream sustainability issues into our planning process and build a vigilant, environmentally conscious, and resource-conserving society.

Calendar of events