An article on environment management perspective
I remember many years ago receiving a call from a bbc journalist
asking which villages in India should they visit to see the impacts of
climate change. This was the early 1990s. I was puzzled and asked "is
climate change here?" Finally the television crew decided to shoot
urban fires in Delhi and drought in Rajasthan to tell their viewers
about how India was reeling under the impact of changing climate
because of increased greenhouse gas emissions.
I wonder what I'd say if I got a similar call today. Would I point to
recent cloudbursts and cyclonic events, which have more or less
drowned several major metropolitan cities in the country? Would I
point to the obvious variations and extreme weather events - from heat
waves to freak snow episodes - to say that our climate has changed?
Clearly the answer isn't simple. It is true every Indian city that has
drowned under the weight of its rain has suffered because of the
progressive mismanagement at the hands of its city managers. It is
true also that the intensity of floods and drought has increased
because we have made the poor even more vulnerable to weather events -
either by destroying the wetlands that absorbed the water or by simply
ruining the land economies of people, which would sustain them in
times of stress.
It is also true that our weather is changing. In other words, we have
a double-whammy - already stressed regions and people who will be
further hit. It is imperative that we reduce our vulnerabilities by
doing 'good' development - investing in the natural resource base of
people to mitigate against drought and floods. Simultaneous it is also
imperative that we reduce global emissions so that the threat of
climate change is contained.
It is for this reason that the world governments party to the
convention on climate change came up with the Clean Development
Mechanism (cdm). The idea was simple: the industrialised north had to
reduce its emissions, partly because its emissions were already
leading to the threats of climate change and partly because to provide
economic and ecological space for the South to increase its emissions.
Two facts were clear: one the North could really not reduce its
emissions substantially as it could not de-link from the fossil fuel
economy that drives growth. Two, the South did not have to make the
mistakes of the emission-flatulent parts of the world. It could
re-engineer its growth trajectory so that it would be more efficient
or less dependent on fossil fuels. It was this reasoning that lead to
cdm - so that the North could pay for the cleaner development in the
South and get credits in its own carbon balance sheet. It was to be a
win-win situation.
This was not to be. In our study of the working of cdm (see 'Newest,
Biggest Deal', Down To Earth, November 15, 2005) we find that it has
become a market mechanism simply - an agreement between private
parties looking to make a fast buck. It is, as we show, not just the
complicated development mechanism but also the corrupt development
mechanism, which is leading to poor quality projects.
It is important to consider why this is so. It will be easy for
commentators in the developed world to blame these transgressions -
corruption or poor project design - on the governments and industries
of the South. But the answer is not so simple.
The fact is that governments (rich) have worked overtime on the design
of cdm so that it is what it is today. For instance, the rules and
procedures that have been developed for cdm are extremely convoluted
and cumbersome and are leading to ineffective projects at the country
level. Take the criterion for "additionality" - what can be done
without a cdm project - which is in turn leading to really creative
carbon accounting and poor quality projects. In fact the current rules
create perverse incentives for governments to do little to combat
climate change.
These over-developed criteria are purportedly the response of the rich
governments and their ngos to protect against "business-as-usual"
dirty projects, which they believe Southern government would want to
push through in the garb of cdm. They don't trust the poor country
governments. The result is bad rules made for bad projects.
The second problem concerns high transaction cost (and procedures) -
because of the compulsory involvement of private auditors and their
procedures, which in turn negates the involvement of community and
small projects in cdm. This was done by rich governments and their
ngos to protect against the lack of credible procedures in the South.
But look at the end result. The procedure stipulates that the project
proponent hires the consultant to do the project design and then hires
the authorised validator to certify the project, based on the
consultant's report. In other words, the entire process is regulated
by mutual self-interest. It is no wonder that Down To Earth indicted
two internationally acclaimed auditors - namely,
PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ernst & Young - for fraudulent project
design documents.
I could go on. But the moot point is that the design of cdm is flawed.
It keeps prices low; it forces the South to discount its advantage in
reducing emissions. It does little for combating climate change. If
the threat of climate change is real, then the answers to it must also
get real. cdm is a half-way house because it does not build a global
climate regime based on entitlements for all. But it can deliver the
building blocks of a cleaner tomorrow. For this we must do things
differently. Much more differently.
- Sunita Narain
thanks,
umalme
I remember many years ago receiving a call from a bbc journalist
asking which villages in India should they visit to see the impacts of
climate change. This was the early 1990s. I was puzzled and asked "is
climate change here?" Finally the television crew decided to shoot
urban fires in Delhi and drought in Rajasthan to tell their viewers
about how India was reeling under the impact of changing climate
because of increased greenhouse gas emissions.
I wonder what I'd say if I got a similar call today. Would I point to
recent cloudbursts and cyclonic events, which have more or less
drowned several major metropolitan cities in the country? Would I
point to the obvious variations and extreme weather events - from heat
waves to freak snow episodes - to say that our climate has changed?
Clearly the answer isn't simple. It is true every Indian city that has
drowned under the weight of its rain has suffered because of the
progressive mismanagement at the hands of its city managers. It is
true also that the intensity of floods and drought has increased
because we have made the poor even more vulnerable to weather events -
either by destroying the wetlands that absorbed the water or by simply
ruining the land economies of people, which would sustain them in
times of stress.
It is also true that our weather is changing. In other words, we have
a double-whammy - already stressed regions and people who will be
further hit. It is imperative that we reduce our vulnerabilities by
doing 'good' development - investing in the natural resource base of
people to mitigate against drought and floods. Simultaneous it is also
imperative that we reduce global emissions so that the threat of
climate change is contained.
It is for this reason that the world governments party to the
convention on climate change came up with the Clean Development
Mechanism (cdm). The idea was simple: the industrialised north had to
reduce its emissions, partly because its emissions were already
leading to the threats of climate change and partly because to provide
economic and ecological space for the South to increase its emissions.
Two facts were clear: one the North could really not reduce its
emissions substantially as it could not de-link from the fossil fuel
economy that drives growth. Two, the South did not have to make the
mistakes of the emission-flatulent parts of the world. It could
re-engineer its growth trajectory so that it would be more efficient
or less dependent on fossil fuels. It was this reasoning that lead to
cdm - so that the North could pay for the cleaner development in the
South and get credits in its own carbon balance sheet. It was to be a
win-win situation.
This was not to be. In our study of the working of cdm (see 'Newest,
Biggest Deal', Down To Earth, November 15, 2005) we find that it has
become a market mechanism simply - an agreement between private
parties looking to make a fast buck. It is, as we show, not just the
complicated development mechanism but also the corrupt development
mechanism, which is leading to poor quality projects.
It is important to consider why this is so. It will be easy for
commentators in the developed world to blame these transgressions -
corruption or poor project design - on the governments and industries
of the South. But the answer is not so simple.
The fact is that governments (rich) have worked overtime on the design
of cdm so that it is what it is today. For instance, the rules and
procedures that have been developed for cdm are extremely convoluted
and cumbersome and are leading to ineffective projects at the country
level. Take the criterion for "additionality" - what can be done
without a cdm project - which is in turn leading to really creative
carbon accounting and poor quality projects. In fact the current rules
create perverse incentives for governments to do little to combat
climate change.
These over-developed criteria are purportedly the response of the rich
governments and their ngos to protect against "business-as-usual"
dirty projects, which they believe Southern government would want to
push through in the garb of cdm. They don't trust the poor country
governments. The result is bad rules made for bad projects.
The second problem concerns high transaction cost (and procedures) -
because of the compulsory involvement of private auditors and their
procedures, which in turn negates the involvement of community and
small projects in cdm. This was done by rich governments and their
ngos to protect against the lack of credible procedures in the South.
But look at the end result. The procedure stipulates that the project
proponent hires the consultant to do the project design and then hires
the authorised validator to certify the project, based on the
consultant's report. In other words, the entire process is regulated
by mutual self-interest. It is no wonder that Down To Earth indicted
two internationally acclaimed auditors - namely,
PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ernst & Young - for fraudulent project
design documents.
I could go on. But the moot point is that the design of cdm is flawed.
It keeps prices low; it forces the South to discount its advantage in
reducing emissions. It does little for combating climate change. If
the threat of climate change is real, then the answers to it must also
get real. cdm is a half-way house because it does not build a global
climate regime based on entitlements for all. But it can deliver the
building blocks of a cleaner tomorrow. For this we must do things
differently. Much more differently.
- Sunita Narain
thanks,
umalme