Achievements of India under the United Nations Millennium Development Goals is a mixed bag.
According to the reports of the Ministry of Statistics and Programme implementation (MOSPI), India’s progress on Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) is a mixed bag. MDGs were adopted by General Assembly of United Nations in year 2000 as a part of a new global partnership to reduce extreme poverty. They constitute 8 goals, 21 targets and 60 indicators to be achieved by the end of 2015. Achievement of different countries varies significantly and ours is a mixed bag. For some indicators, like halving the percentage of population below the poverty line, India already achieved the target level. For some indicators, like ratio of girls to boys in primary and secondary education and tertiary education, India is expected to reach close to the target level by end 2015 if not actually meet the target level.
But, for rest of the Indicators such as share of women in wage employment in the non–agricultural sector, and proportion of population with access to improved sanitation, we are far from target. On the other hand, China has registered better results. One of the reasons for far-from-satisfactory performance of India is the structural limitations of concerned institutions. Now, international community is gearing towards post 2015 development agenda with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). While MDGs were primarily focussed to enhance the basic quality of life in developing nations, SDGs encompass both developing and developed nations.
During the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) in 2012, a new global development framework of SDGs was adopted to replace MDGs after 2015. This framework proposal contains 17 goals with 169 targets covering a broad range of sustainable development issues, including ending poverty and hunger, improving health and education, making cities more sustainable, combating climate change, and protecting oceans and forests.
The goals are intended to advance sustainable development through greater integration of its three pillars: economic, social, and environmental. The SDGs are expected to be adopted formally at a United Nations Summit in September 2015 and come into play at the end of Dec 2015 as MDGs expire.
A close observation of SDGs indicates that some indicators have more influence than others in the sense that proper management of that particular indicator will have impact on other parameters, for instance water resource. Water resources, per se, appear to be common thread for most of objectives, from ending poverty to achieve food security to healthy lives and so on.
Deservingly, concern for water is expressed in Proposed Goal 6 – Ensure availability and sustainable use of water and sanitation for all. The targets for this goal are by 2030, among others: improve water quality by reducing pollution, eliminating dumping of chemicals and hazardous materials, doubling publicly operated wastewater and sludge treatment and increasing recycling and reuse globally. In this context, it is the role of the institutions that loom large for realisation of goals and in the context of water resources, it is Pollution Control Boards that need to deliver.
Organic pollutionIndia has about 16 per cent of the world's population but as compared to only 4 per cent of its water resources. The annual per capita availability of renewable freshwater in the country has fallen from around 6042 cubic metre in 1947 to 1845 cubic metre in 2007. Given the projected increase in population by the end of 21st century, the per capita availability is likely to drop below 1000 cubic metres, leading to a situation that can be labelled as water scarcity.
A Central Pollution Control Board study (2011) reported that in addition to total and faecal coliform which indicate the presence of pathogens in water, organic pollution continues to be the predominant pan-Indian pollutant of water resources, in other words, water resources becoming all the more scarce.
These shortages would be further aggravated by climate change, population growth,
irrigation requirements and industrialisation etc. The challenges of water resource management may be addressed through four broad approaches a) Improving efficiencies and minimising losses; b) Recharging groundwater aquifers; c) Abatement and treatment of water pollution; d) Reuse and recycling of wastewater. In this context, the organisation that is pivotal for this achievement are PCBs.
However, ever since their establishment four decades back, these boards have been caught in dynamic stall with more of ‘policing’ and less of restoring the quality of water bodies. This ‘dynamic stall’ is best represented in the fact that despite every polluter adhering to the emission standards prescribed by the PCBs, quality of water resources across the country is deteriorating continuously.
Equipped with concentration based standards, poor enforcement level etc, it is time for these PCBs to break their tortoise-shell and to lead path to ensure sustainability. Revamping the standards, at lease reasonable revision of standards that considers the health of receiving effluents should be the first step towards that direction.
