Mapping Asia’s first Green Government

5 February 2009

US President Barack Obama’s green call has found an early echo in the Himalayas, with the north Indian mountainous state of Himachal Pradesh becoming the first government in Asia in setting an administrative road map to being a carbon-free state.
Carbon emissions and resultant global warming cause 154,000 deaths annually, according to a World Health Organization (WHO) study at the turn of the millennium, with fatalities from malaria to malnutrition. Children in developing countries are expected to be worst affected and overall deaths are feared to double by 2020. India’s carbon and other greenhouse gas emissions are ranked among the highest in the world, along with the USA, China, Russia, Japan and Germany.

In a proposed partnership with the US state of California that is known for landmark climate change law called the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, Himachal Pradesh’s “environment auditors” will keep carbon count of the functioning of all governmental departments. The state, that was once part of the ancient Central Asian trade routes to Tibet over the Shipki La mountain pass on the India-China border, enjoys a progressive administration that Transparency International rates as one of the least corrupt in India. While much of India struggles dealing with the local police, Himachal Pradesh citizens can file a police complaint online.

The Himachal government’s green move is expected to produce cleaner lifestyle options for the six million residents of the state, in what is ironically already one of the most litter-free states in India. The popular Himachal tourist town of Manali, for instance, boasts a main street as clean as the proverbial whistle and offers a delightful visual contrast after the generally filthy, uncollected garbage across the nearby noisy eyesore of Uttar Pradesh, one of the dirtiest states in India. Himachal had previously launched a series of environment protection measures such as the “Trans Himalayan Development Authority” to protect Himalayan ecology and to reduce damage from greenhouse gas emissions. The measures are expected to sustain the environment of the entire northern Indian region. In mid-January, the Himachal government announced an environment master plan “Policy & Strategy on Climate Change & Harnessing Carbon Credits”, with special focus on development projects, a critical area as the Himalayan region suffers from runaway land mafias and unplanned development often on encroached public-owned land. In September 2008, the Himachal government established a “Governing Council on Climate Change” and an Executive Council involving 21 governmental departments mandated to monitor the state implementing India’s National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPCC) of June 2008, an eight-mission plan ~ Solar Energy, Enhanced Energy Efficiency, Sustainable Habitat, Conserving Water, Sustaining the Himalayan Ecosystem, A Green India, Sustainable Agriculture, Strategic Knowledge Platform for Climate Change ~ announced by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to ensure that “India’s per capita greenhouse gas emissions would not exceed the per capita GHG emissions of developed countries”.

In October 2008, the Himachal Pradesh government announced a “green tax” on vehicle-users to create a corpus fund for dealing with climate change, a first of its kind initiative in the country. Not surprisingly, Himachal topped the first Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) ranking, an index that the Centre for Development Finance, part of the Chennai-based Institute for Financial Management and Research, developed in December 2008 to rank, on a 1 to 100 scale, the environment performance of 28 Indian states and project their potential to protect the environment. Other Indian states and neighbouring countries could follow the Himachal carbon emission-controlling route, more so as the state also expects its green map to earn US $2.27 billion from selling certified emissions reduction to the USA in carbon credit trading. Himachal’s environment and forest minister JP Nadda told local media that 12,000 hectares has been made available for carbon credits. “A validator from the World Bank is to verify that this land is available for only growing trees,’’ Nadda said. The overall greening of Himachal Pradesh has resulted in the state owing forest wealth at valued at over US $30.5 billion, estimates chief minister Prem Kumar Dhumal.

The Himachal government had also provided four energy-efficient CFLs (compact fluorescent lamps) per family, as part of a US $16.2 million project in a state that has a relatively rare achievement of having ensured electricity for all its 20,118 villages. In June 2004, Himachal Pradesh was also the first state in India to successfully ban the manufacture and use of small polythene bags, with about 20 government officials empowered to implement the ban. The new Himachal governmental plan also involves a new way of garbage disposal by civic bodies ~ Manali town, for instance, already has street cleaners more often seen swishing brooms during the day than anywhere else in India ~ and clearing debris of developmental works such as hydro-electric projects and bridge construction. Himachal has also approached year 2007 Nobel laureate RK Pachauri, in his capacity as chairman of the United Nations Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change, as part of strengthening its green governance template that the rest of pollution-challenged Asia can use.