Stop gaps
THIS book has come at a time when humankind the world over is grappling with the challenge of providing a cleaner environment. However, the continuing high levels of pollution, especially in the developing countries, is rapidly taking humankind to the brink of disaster. The authors of this book feel that a major cause for this sorry state of affairs is the poorly implemented policies to check pollution.
Though direct government regulation for controlling pollution can be justified for toxic and hazardous products, the authors feel that the most effective policies are those that combine government intervention with market-based instruments (mbis). This boils down to taxing the polluter and subsidising industries and technologies that are eco-friendly so as to align social impacts with economic benefits and costs.
The book proposes four alternative pollution control regimes for India. In the first option, the government charges polluting industries and is responsible for clean-up. In the second option, the government charges polluters but emission treatment plants are operated by a third party and there are independent monitoring and enforcing agencies. The third option is a tax-cum-subsidy scheme. The fourth is the tradeable permits system where the government prescribes pollution limits for a region and auctions pollution rights to firms. If the permit holding of a firm exceeds its actual emissions, then the balance permit holding can be sold to another firm which then has to ensure that its aggregate emissions are equal to or less than the value of total permits.
The book also includes the results of a study which applies these alternative instruments to cleaning up waste water from the paper and pulp industry and analyses the cost and burden of each alternative relative to profits.
These policy measures require constant monitoring but the data required for the purpose are inadequate. It also needs to be probed whether our economy is ready to accept the proposed mbis. Emulating other nations may not be easy as our experiences with globalisation shows.
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