NEW DELHI : While India was “cleaner than other countries” in term of climate change impact at this stage of economy, there is concern over hazardous waste management and the country was looking for cooperation from European countries in the area.
“Our co-processing of hazardous waste is not even 1 per cent. And, there is a tremendous scope of co-operation with the European countries,” Additional Secretary, Ministry of Environment, Susheel Kumar said.
He was speaking at the ‘7th EU-India Environment Forum’ here, themed on role played by resources efficiency and the circular economy in meeting environmental challenges.
“Our growth so far has been cleaner than other countries at this stage of economy, in terms of climate change impact and not the pollution aspect.
“If you see growth and pollution linkage…. We have traditionally a sustainable lifestyle, and our emission per unit of GDP (Gross Domestic Product) is much lower than any other country at this stage of economy,” he said.
Pitching for suitable legislative framework and institutional efficiency at all levels of the government and other stakeholders, Kumar said, work was on to get a suitable business model of cooperation between India and the European countries, but there was a need to expedite it.
“….There is a tremendous scope of co-operation with the European countries…There is a project also going on and we had asked to prepare bushiness model to take it forward…” he said.
Opening the Forum, Ambassador and Head of Delegation of the European Union to India, Joao Cravinho, said India and the EU together could move towards a more sustainable growth model.
“It’s a new government in India..New authorities in Brussels (EU headquarters)…This is the best possible moment…To compare and how each can contribute to the other,” he said.
“We need to look how we can make markets for secondary raw material work better and how we can create business models that are more resource efficient…. How we can encourage design, durability, repairability, recyclability to provide predictability and clarity for investor and business,” he said.
Kumar also proposed to take the Indian environmental legislative framework on board the discussion during the Forum and sought “concrete outcomes” at the end of it.
Additional Secretary Kumar also said that “circular
economy that allows greater recycling and less waste generation should be the way ahead.”
On environmental laws, he said, the government has been working on bringing amendments to the legislative framework and amalgamate them together in a holistic policy framework.
“Most of our policies are in public domain on our website and people have offered suggestions also to us there,” he said.
Global and Regional Challenges, Life Program, of the Directorate-General Environment at the EU, Timo Makela, also concurred that time was right for both India and the EU for co-operation.
“The idea is to encourage circular economy from using to recycling and rather than the current linear way of waste management that sends waste to landfill,” he said.
Makela said “new legislative framework” are being discussed in EU Parliament and now would be coming that would “ban” sending biomass to the landfill.
“Six countries in the EU don’t do landfill anymore and other countries are struggling with the issue and there are others which can’t do without landfill. But, political will is needed to go towards a higher resource efficiency and better waste management and we also seek ideas from India that we can take back home from this forum,” he said. (AGENCIES)
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