Historical responsibility matters, not obliged to pay for loss & damage finance: India stance

“IPCC reports tell us that warming is directly proportional to the contribution of cumulative emissions of carbon dioxide. India’s share in historical cumulative emissions since pre-industrial times is less than four per cent. From 1990, after which awareness about climate change and its impacts started, India’s share in total emissions of carbon dioxide is only 5 per cent. This is despite India being home to more than one-sixth of the humanity,” the source argued.

“Considering per capita emissions, India’s emissions, even today, are about one-third of the average. India ranks 129th in the world on average per capita cumulative emissions till 2019, and 126th on average annual per capita emissions.”

It was “mistaken discourse” to point out that India was one of the largest emitters of the world today.

“Considering the fair share of the global carbon budget for countries, and calculating their carbon debt and credit, the Annex-I countries (those listed in annexure 1 of UN Framework Convention on Climate Change) owe the world a carbon debt of 790 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent due to cumulative emissions between 1850 and 2019. If monetized, even at the modest carbon price of USD 100 per tonne, the Annex-I countries owe the world a carbon debt worth USD 79 trillion. This is the correct and equitable way of setting the benchmark for loss and damage calculations,” the source argued. “By the same benchmark, India has carbon credit of more than 248 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, worth trillions.