Business Standard / New Delhi July 04, 2008, 0:37 IST The much-awaited national action plan on climate change, unveiled by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ahead of his departure for Japan to attend the G-8 summit as a special invitee, was patently timed to serve as a bargaining tool at the global level but, aside from that, is designed to serve a domestic agenda. Since climate change is set to figure prominently at the G-8 meet, such a policy document will be used to parry the pressure on India (as also on China) to take on mandatory targets for reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The impression has gained ground in recent months that India is, if anything, more hard-line on climate change issues than China, and also that India compares poorly with China when it comes to domestic correctives. The layout out of a formal document for domestic action, even if couched in general terms, is therefore a gambit to stave off pressure from the G-8. But the plan does not offer anything targets for reducing GHG emissions. In other words, India is not about to give the developed countries what they have been asking for, and which they might ask for again in Japan. So it remains to be seen whether the gambit will work. China too has put in place a climate action plan. But India is in a different position from China on the climate change issue because the country is neither a major emitter of GHGs nor is it likely to become one in the near future, whereas China is believed to have already overtaken the US as one of the largest polluters. The government, therefore, has done well to stick to the basic Indian position, which is to emphasise per capita GHG emissions as the yardstick for reckoning a country's contribution to environmental degradation and fixing responsibilities for undoing it. This is an aspect which has been forcefully underscored in the action plan document and presumably will be put forward again at the G-8 meet. The new point in the action plan is that it proposes sector-wise benchmarks and does its own version of domestic carbon credit trade. It also proposes caps on energy use in polluting sectors, such as thermal power, cement, fertiliser and iron and steel. Going further, it provides for retirement of certain categories of old and inefficient coal-based power plants and phasing out of end-of-life vehicles with the mandatory obligation on the last owners to hand them over at designated collection centres. However, its stipulation for doubling the level of ethanol doping of petrol may create implementation problems as it will entail either the import of ethanol at high cost (global ethanol prices are surging in tandem with crude oil) or setting aside land for growing bio-fuel crops at the cost of producing other farm produce. But, at the same time, its proposals for offering tax sops to promote fuel efficiency in vehicles and setting up a combustion research institute to upscale vehicular engine efficiency seem well-intended. So is, of course, the stipulation of establishing eight missions to promote clean sources of energy and expand carbon sinks by increasing the green cover. These missions are mandated to achieve some well-chosen objectives, such as promoting the use of solar energy, safeguarding the Himalayan glaciers and maintaining efficient water resource management, launching sustainable habitats and making agriculture more resilient to climate change. What is needed is to assign responsibility for achieving these goals, operationalise concrete programmes for each sub-set of objectives, and set up a system for monitoring the action under this