16 Times Jeff Bezoz’s Net Worth: What India Needs to Spend to Combat Climate Change

New Delhi: With an estimated cost of $2.5 trillion till 2030, the Economic Survey said India would “endeavour to do the best possible” in the global battle against climate change, but called for “substantial scaling up of financial resources” by developed countries and providing “credible” numbers as to “exact size” of climate finance towards developing countries. As per India’s NDC, preliminary estimates say the country would require around “$206 billion between 2015 and 2030 for implementing adaptation actions in key areas like agriculture, forestry, fisheries infrastructure, water resources and ecosystems.” Additional investments would also be needed for “strengthening resilience and disaster management” and that preliminary total estimates for India’s climate change action would between now and 2030 would be $2.5 trillion. While maintaining that the “value of loans” was being “over-reported”, the survey added that “if the finance for development projects that only partially cover climate change were reported more accurately, annual bilateral flows of public climate finance could be between $10 billion and $15 billion lower than reported.” It added that grant-based assistance remained low and only an estimated $11-13 billion was given as grant, constituting just 23-27 per cent of the total public climate finance. The survey claimed that India’s policies had taken the “corrective initiatives” towards the efficient utilisation of its available resources, pointing out that 33 states and union territories had already created State Action Plan on Climate Change, while a Union government scheme, ‘Climate Change Action Programme ’ was launched in 2019 at a cost of Rs 290 crore.