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ENVIRONMENTAL ECONOMICS
Table-1: India’s Economic Growth
Plan
Period
Real Income
Plan
Target
Use Of Natural Resources
India is rich in terms of natural resource
endowments and biodiversity. The nation
is one of the 12 mega biodiversity countries
in the world. More than 45000 flora
and 77000 species of fauna are recorded.
The natural ecosystem include 16 types of
forests 5 types of grass lands, 27,403 wetland
units (both inland and coastal) including
lakes, swamps, tanks and reservoirs,
tidal mudflats, mangroves, estuaries,
lagoons, coral reefs, sand beach (Verma
et. al, 2007). These resources provide a
flow of environmental (ecosystem) services
required for production/economic
development. However, the depletion and
degradation of natural resources pose a
serious threat to the sustained flow of
these ecosystem services. The uncertainty
of quality and quantity of such services
has not been suitably factored into the development
models. Forest is the second
largest land use in India next to agriculture.
The latest assessment of forest survey
of India in 2003 estimated about 67.8 million
hectares of forest cover in the country
Actual
Growth
Sectoral Growth Rate
Agriculture Industry Services
First Plan 1951-56 2.1 3.6 2.9 5.9 3.7
Second Plan 1956-61 4.5 3.9 3.2 6.4 4.6
Third Plan 1961-66 5.6 2.3 -0.5 6.8 5.0
Fourth Plan 1969-74 5.7 3.2 2.6 3.7 4.0
Fifth Plan 1974-79 4.4 4.8 3.4 6.3 5.5
Sixth Plan 1980-85 5.2 5.7 5.5 6.2 5.4
Seventh Plan 1985-90 5.0 6.0 3.4 7.5 7.4
Eighth Plan 1992-97 5.6 6.8 3.9 8.0 7.9
Ninth Plan 1997-02 6.5 5.5 2.1 4.6 8.1
Tenth Plan 2002-07 8.0 7.2* 1.7 8.3 9.0
Eleventh Plan 2007-12 9.0 - 4.1* 10.5* 9.9*
* projected.
Sources: Planning Commission, Govt. of India & http://www.indiastat.com
which is 20.64 percent of the total geographical
area (FSI, 2005). It shows a marginal
increase in the total forest cover, but
the loss of 2.6 million ha of dense forests
when compared to previous assessment in
2001. The nation is targeted to achieve 33
per cent of its area under forest and tree
cover by 2012. The per capita availability
of land in India has declined from 0.91 ha
to 0.33 ha between 1950 and 2001.The per
capita availability of farm land declined
from 0.64 ha to 0.25 ha during the same
period. India occupies 4 per cent of world’s
water resources which are depleting fast.
In 1947, the per capita availability of fresh
water in India was 5150 cu.m but it reduced
to 2200 cu.m in 2000. It is projected
that in 2017, the same will become 1600
cu.m. resulting water stress in many places.
The melting of glaziers in Himalayas and
other climate change related issues can
lead to irreversible changes in ecosystems.
India is said to be particularly vulnerable
due to these effects.
While there is overall decline in India’s
bio-capacity, its use has increased faster
to meet the growing needs of development.
Electricity generation in India has
increased from 6 billion KWH to 556 billion
KWH between 1951 and 2001. The
coal production has increased from 32
million tonnes to 332 million tones between
1951 and 2001. In 2006, the production
was 670 million tones. In order to
meet the growing demand for energy, the
production is targeted to increase to 670
million tones by 2012. In addition to domestic
production, 40-50 million tones of
superior coal is required to be imported
during the 11 th plan period. Crude oil imports
increased from six million tones to
78 million tones between 1961 and 2001
(Table-2).
Ecological Footprint
An ecological footprint measures people’s
demand on nature and compares human
consumption of natural resources with the
Earth’s ecological capacity (bio-capacity)
to regenerate them. A country’s ecological
Available estimates show that humanity’s ecological footprint
has exceeded the bio-capacity of the planet by late
1980s. Presently, we are using 30 percent more
resources than the planet can regenerate
footprint is the total area required to produce
the food and fibre that it consumes,
absorb its waste, and provide space for its
infrastructure. People consume resources
and ecological services all over the world,
so their footprint is the sum of these areas,
wherever they are on the planet. Ecologi-
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