Open Forum
New Delhi, 3 November
2021
COP26 & India
WEATHER EVENTS DAUNTING
By Dhurjati Mukherjee
As the COP26 Summit at
Glasgowkicked off, the struggleof reaching an agreement to keep the world on a
1.5-degree trajectory of rising temperatures, stares world leaders in the face.
With reports suggesting that emissions are increasing at a
fast pace, the obvious result is the increase in extreme weather events, as
seen with stormy
weather sweeping the United Kingdom bringing suspected tornadoes to parts of
the country.
At the opening session,
UN climate chief Patricia Espinosa confessed that the task of swiftly shifting
the world’s economy onto a greener trajectory, to avoid increasingly deadly
climate impacts, was enormously difficult. “The transition we need is beyond
the scope, scale and speed of anything humanity has accomplished in the past.
It is a daunting task. But humanity is a species defined by its ingenuity,” she
said.What way forward it finds eventually, obviously will be closely
watched.
At the home front, arriving
in Glasgow for the Summit, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted he looked forward
to working with other world leaders on mitigating climate change and
articulating India's efforts in this regard.Well-intentioned
alright, but strategy needs a re-look or sharp refining. Recent events of
torrential rain and floods in Uttarakhand and Kerala recently bear testimony to
the fact that climate change can play havoc with the weather, resulting in loss
of innumerable lives. It goes without saying that like most governments, India
too has taken nature for granted as a result of which such developments are
occurring time and again.
While global leaders
try to find solutions, a recent report of the United Nations Environment
Programme (UNEP), projected that the world’s greenhouse gas emissions will fall
by only 7.5 percent by 2030 under currently pledged national emission lowering
actions instead of 30 percent required to limit global warming to 2 degrees
Celsius. The voluntary pledges of respective countries will place the world on
track for a global temperature rise of 2.70 C, it pointed out.
The report found that
India along with several other G20 countries are expected to release more earth
warming emissions during 2030 than they did in 2010. This is despite all the
actions reported to have been taken by the Indian government to reduce pollution
and also its high profile publicity of focusing on non-renewable energy.
The change in weather
events, which have become quite frequent in recent years in the country range
from climate change to anthropogenic commissions such as cutting down of
mountains, indiscriminate felling of trees, stone quarrying in ecologically
sensitive zones, conversions of paddy field that used to absorb rains, the
mining of river beds, razing hills for indiscriminate construction, mono crop
cultivation and so on. One may refer to Madhav Gadgil’s report way back in 2011
that predicted the possible calamities that would be caused by the destruction
of the Western Ghats on account of encroachment, quarrying and other factors.
But political parties of all hues worked together to reject the report to
appease vote banks.
In an article in
Nature in 2013, it had cautioned that rising temperatures in the Himalayas
raise the threat of glacial floods. Of the 8800 glacial lakes in the Himalayas,
over 200 have been classified as ‘dangerous’.Himalayan nations were urged to
build an international network to monitor risks such as those from glacial
lakes and give early warning of hazards. The landslides in the Himalayan river
catchments is well-known and are triggered by a plethora of natural and
man-made factors such as heavy rainfall, earthquake, deforestation, large-scale
land use changes and so on.
Similar to the
Rishiganga disaster, the destructive 1970 floods that caused devastation in the
Ganga Valley also lay in the Rishiganga watershed. The question arises – why do
we suffer death and destruction despite available scientific information?
Experts believe, and quite rightly, that investment in proactive scientific
approaches – natural hazard surveillance or flood forecasting – to prevent
disasters is missing. The other concern is that our policy makers do not appear
to take cognizance to good science and implement recommendations of scientists,
at least with regard to disaster management.
One may refer here to
a study by the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNIDR) which, in
consultation with the Centre for Research on Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED),
found that India suffered economic losses of $80 billion during the 20-year
period of 1998 to 2017. India has been ranked among the world’s top four
countries in absolute economic losses, the others being US, China and Japan.
The losses increased by over 120 percent in the last 20 years compared to the
preceding two decades (1978-1997).
If losses from
climate related disaster are taken into account, they have gone up by 151
percent. India has been found to be the worst sufferer of disaster related
deaths and economic loses. Thousands of lives are lost and hundreds of crores
worth of properties destroyed every year, though not all of them are reported,
a fact authenticated by the UN report.
The lack of
government action has once again become a reality this year though scientific
studies and international reports have urged the need to take remedial
action. As mentioned earlier, the government is not much interested in
adhering to advice of experts in tackling adverse weather events, specially
floods, cyclones and landslides which mostly affect the poor living in
mountainous regions and coastal areas.
It may be pertinent
here to refer to an US intelligence assessment which identified India and
Pakistan among 11 countries that are ‘highly vulnerable’ in their ability to
prepare for and respond to environmental and societal crisis caused by climate
change. This first ever US National Intelligence Estimate on climate stated
that India and China will play crucial roles in determining the trajectory of
global temperature rise while glossing over the West’s contribution to the
crisis. “China and India are the first and fourth largest emitters
respectively, and low carbon sources and both are growing their total and per
capita emissions whereas the US and the EU – as the second and third largest –
are declining”, the report observed while acknowledging both countries are
incorporating more renewable sources into the energy mix.
The introduction of
environmental assessments in the Himalayas would protect the fragility of the
mountains and address concerns about providing economic incentives to local people
without harming the environment. Compensation afforestation programmes funded
by hydropower corporations need to be effectively monitored. These activities
must mandatorily involve local communities, civil society organizations and
women’s self-help groups for meaningful results. The relocation of vulnerable
villages and imposition of penalties for erecting structures on river banks are
also necessary.
Thus all talks and
plans of action will not become a reality unless there is political will and proper
strategy in tackling the climate menace. The challenge for India is possibly
more than most nations due to the population density, coastal crowding coupled
with rampant violation of environmental rules and regulations. Moreover,
keeping in view the fact that “in a moderate climate change scenario, India is
projected to potentially lose between 0.8 percent and 2 percent of its GDP by
mid-century”, as per a G20 report, it is all the more necessary that remedial action
be taken at the earliest.---INFA
(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)
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