(IN): PM Indians eat less meat and so are more restrained in emission than pe

[Guest guest]

" Indians eat less meat and so are more restrained in emission than

people in the West " , says Shri Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister (INDIA)

 

Link:

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1070529/asp/frontpage/story_7845394.asp

 

Country is clean, thank the elite

OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

 

New Delhi, May 28: Indians eat less meat and so are more restrained in

emission than people in the West. This is what Manmohan Singh will

tell the G8 summit next week if some in his government have their way.

 

And that the country belches less gas because its elite is used to

eating leftovers.

 

The environment ministry doesn't picture this as an after-dinner joke

at the high table of the world's richest nations to which the Prime

Minister has been invited.

 

It sees this as a policy statement against trying too hard to cut the

emission of greenhouse gases (GHGs), a subject certain to animate

discussions at the meeting in Germany.

 

The German foreign and environment ministers, Frank-Walter Steinmeier

and Sigmar Gabriel, are expected to push India and China, another

guest at the summit, to cut their GHG emissions. These heat-trapping

gases fuel global warming and cause climate change, one of the most

pressing world issues.

 

But environment secretary Pradipto Ghosh explained why Delhi should

treat all such lectures as so much emission — er, hot air. India's

hands are cleaner than the West's, he said, because its elite is far

more environmentally conscious.

 

Indians don't use and throw away; they " recycle " everything from

clothes to shoes to food. Old clothes are handed down from the elder

to the younger until they end up in ragpickers' hands.

 

" I bet that even in Mukesh Ambani's house, they recycle commodities as

much as I do in mine. We do not, by tradition and conditioning,

believe in conspicuous consumption, " Ghosh said.

 

Such an argument might stick in the throat of the Prime Minister, who

last week rebuked the rich for their lavish parties and showy weddings.

 

But Ghosh has an answer to every question. Tell him that India

contributes nearly 5 per cent to global emissions, and he insists that

its per capita emission is far lower than the West's.

 

Which brings the issue back to meat-eating. Even the elite in India is

restrained in meat consumption, Ghosh said, and claimed that

vegetarian societies contribute little to gas emissions.

 

And then the clincher: Indians use fuel-efficient automobiles rather

than fume-spewing ones. That should make truck drivers happier than

the Richard Gere-Shilpa Shetty peck at an AIDS function.

 

So, India will not accept any proposal to cut emission if that hits

its GDP. " And any legally mandated GHG mitigation efforts would

adversely affect our growth, " Ghosh said.

 

His logic inverts that of the US, the world's biggest polluter.

President George Bush has rejected the Kyoto Protocol that caps

emissions till 2012, citing the harm to US economy and the " unfair "

exclusion of China and India.

 

" We have done more than the developed countries. Our policies have

shown results and by 2020, there would be a 25 per cent reduction in

our GHG emissions, " Ghosh said.

 

But according to a ministry expert, India's emissions will more than

double by 2020.

 

The German foreign minister said: " At a meeting last year in Helsinki,

European and Asian leaders promised new carbon reduction goals.

However, they set no firm targets, facing resistance from China and

India. "

 

In recent years, global warming has stopped being an academic issue.

Its effects are showing in melting glaciers, floods, droughts and more

frequent hurricanes. Experts have drawn disaster charts by the decade

and degree Celsius.

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