India to pay dearly for high growth: WB

A study says India’s growing economy will take its toll on its environmental resources, reports Chetan Chauhan.

Updated on: Apr 11, 2007, 12:19:35 IST

None | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

India’s growing economy that will scale a record high by 2020 will take its toll on environmental and financial resources, a new World Bank study has predicted.

World Bank conducted case studies in seven states on three high-growth sectors - energy, highways and industry -to gauge its impact on environment and said it would be the "biggest challenge" for India in coming years. The study found that growth in these sectors was environmentally unsustainable.

The 8,000-mw Singrauli Housing Power Generation that displaced more than three lakh people since 1960s is an example.

Environment Secretary Prodipto Ghosh admitted India's growing economy will put unprecedented pressure on environment and natural resources - water, land, air, soil and forests.

Relating "Country Environment Analysis for India" on poor compliance of industry norms, Kseniya Lvovsky, Lead Environment Economist at World Bank, said country-wise average compliance ratio of industries monitored is only 50 per cent though environment compliance is set to improve.

India finds itself next to Bangladesh on global environmental sustainability index.

Environmentalists say only bigger industries are monitored and small and medium scale industries that contribute 70 per cent to total industrial pollution load are let off the hook. The report urged the government to start specialised environment programmes for industries and improve their performance without affecting business. For instance, furnaces in Agra, adopted an indigenously-developed clean technology. World Bank said monitoring of Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) issued by government was not effective. It affected ecology and recommended strengthening of post EIA clearance.

Considering negative impact of economic growth on environment, World Bank has proposed measures to improve compliance, including transparency and accountability of the environment regulators, increasing their scope, better public participation in regulation and providing fiscal assistance to industry.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

Follow India news real-time updates and the latest news covered on Hindustan Times, featuring today's critical updates on Sonam Wangchuk Hunger Strike LIVE and more across India.