India must include the cost of ecosystem services in the daily life of a citizen and this can only be possible through a well-designed environmental auditing system that is customised for its needs, specific problems and latent opportunities

Environmental accounting or green accounting is a concept that calculates the cost of a nation’s economic impact on nature. In recent years, owing to rising pollution levels and climate change, the environment has been suffering in a major way. Therefore, calls for conducting green accounting on a strict and regular basis have been growing louder and stronger.

However, environmental accounting is nowhere near what it should be, as far as India is concerned. This is mainly due to the fact that the political parties and mainstream leaders are not highlighting the benefits of this outstanding concept and the potential role it can play in assessing the cost of a country’s development on its natural world.

As Mahatma Gandhi famously said, “Mother Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not for every man’s greed.” This insightful observation alone is an indication of how relevant environmental accounting is in India’s context, as envisioned way back by the Father of the Nation. Sadly, the concept is yet to come of age in the country.

The spiralling costs of progress have been paid, time and again, by India. The 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy is one of the most painful examples of this. But, in spite of this, it is still a mystery how India is yet to measure the ecological costs we pay on a regular basis for the economic progress we log. Additionally, awareness among the masses is conspicuous by its absence as far as green accounting is concerned.

Thankfully, today’s world is no longer willing to be a mute spectator to Mother Nature being made to pay the cost of a nation’s growth and progress. Countries are exceedingly being watched and called out by the global community for environmental transgressions. Be it soil erosion, melting glaciers, the increasingly growing carbon footprint or deforestation, all these aspects are being diligently watched and documented by international conservation communities.

This in turn is now forcing nations across the world to adopt an inclusive approach towards economic development and ensure that  industrial development is sustainable and in tune with the interests of the environment.

India must introduce a recharged and revamped system of environmental accounting that takes a comprehensive view of how a nation can progress without paying huge environmental penalties. This new accounting system must be end to end, so that it encapsulates the common man on one side and the Gross Domestic Product on the other. In between, it should be able to link and audit natural resources besides ensuring that the methodology of their use not only reduces wastage but also promotes and encourages their responsible recharge. This, done efficiently, can script a turnaround in how natural resources are used and promote accountability in their usage as well. Today, Indians are enjoying many of the benefits brought by economic progress but we are not entirely aware of their environmental costs. In our system of living, the environmental costs of a specific facility or a perk are not explicitly highlighted and neither are the people enjoying the facility or the perk tuned to its ecological footprint. This is not apathy nor ignorance, this disregard stems for the fact that the citizens have not been trained to respect the environment and understand its value.

Therefore, when the ecology suffers on account of some progress the same is neither reported nor quantified. So, the environment ends up sacrificing its present for India’s future. This is insensitive and unacceptable to say the least and must end forthwith. India must include the cost of ecosystem services in the daily life of a citizen and this can only be possible through a well-designed environmental accounting system that is customised for the nation’s needs, specific problems and latent opportunities. In order for India to be on the top of this initiative, it is critical that green accounting is included in every part of life, more so, in the corporate sector. The Government must also rely on technology and convey the environment cost of India’s progress to its citizens. This can be done by giving a ranking to each project, public or private, on its cost to the environment. This will not only educate people but also ensure that project managers become acutely aware of their responsibility to ensure ecologically accountable development.

(The writer is an environmental journalist)