Much of the debate on green economy has been conducted in G20 countries with an emphasis on high-technology low-carbon solutions and correcting banking and corporate failures. On the other hand, low-income countries see GE as a threat to their competitiveness and are suspicious about the green economy agenda. There are fears that an international agreement generated by the Earth Summit could fail to address the structural issues within the global economy that perpetuate poverty, inequality and resource degradation. There are also worries that an emphasis on technological solutions could generate global economic growth without creating new jobs to replace those lost in the recent economic collapse.

Integrating environment and development is the cornerstone to achieving the goal of a Green Economy. The past two decades have witnessed rapidly growing economic activity accompanied by rising trends for a swathe of other factors, e.g., population, damming of rivers, consumption of fertilisers and paper, use of water, communication and tourism - all of which have negative environmental impacts (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment 2005). The cumulative effect of such trends is that ecological limits are being breached and there is a clear need to respond quickly and effectively.

Protection of the environment has to be a central part of any sustainable inclusive growth strategy. A growing load of pollutants and global warming caused as an externality to economic development are now issues of serious concern. Adoption of development policies duly taking into account the environmental concerns is now becoming a prime necessity of all growing countries. As a result, environmental policies and plans have become a fundamental part in all government schemes. Thus, any movement towards a low-carbon, climate-resilient development pathway in India has to be visualised in the context of this unfinished agenda of poverty alleviation, overall human development and attainment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

An important feature of any environmental strategy is that environmental objectives require action in several areas, which typically lie in the purview of different ministries. The Ministry of Environment and Forests has the important role of monitoring the development process and its environmental impact in a perspective of sustainable development and to devise suitable regulatory structures to achieve the desired results. While this role is crucial, environmental objectives can only be achieved if environmental concerns are internalised in policy making in a large number of sectors. This would require sharing of responsibility at all levels of government and across sectors with respect to monitoring of pollution, enforcement of regulations, and development of programmes for mitigation and abatement. Regulatory enforcement must be combined with incentives, including market and fiscal mechanisms to encourage both industry and people in their day-to-day working lives so as to act in a manner responsive to environmental concerns. Sustainable use of natural resources requires community participation with a responsible role assigned to the communities for conservation.

The contention is that environmental mainstreaming capacity will be much stronger if stakeholders are able to select appropriate tools and methods. Too many tools are being ‘pushed’ by outside interests, and too few locally developed (and more informal, or less expensive) approaches are widely known. There is not enough ‘demand-pull’ information from potential users; neither is there enough information available that helps them to select the right tools themselves-as opposed to taking what others want to promote. q