Debate renewed on blame for global warming

THE 1990-91 edition of World Resources, brought out by the Washington-based World Resources Institute (WRI), concluded developing countries as a group contribute to nearly half of the global warming problem. This was an astonishing finding, given that it was widely believed global warming is largely caused by heavy fossil use by the North. The Centre for Science and Environment published a rejoinder to the WRI report. Entitled Global Warming in an Unequal World, its authors, Anil Agarwal and Sunita Narain, pointed out that the WRI model distributes the "absorption credits" of the earth's natural sinks in proportion to a country's emissions. They then noted that, in effect, this gave the biggest polluter the biggest share. They argued that the sinks are a global heritage and their absorption benefits, therefore, ought to be equally distributed among all human beings. Using this logic, the CSE assigned each nation a share of the sink equal to its proportion of the world's population. A nation's total emissions of greenhouse gases were then compared with its sink quota to determine its net contribution. Using this model, Agarwal and Narain arrived at a dramatically different set of conclusions. India, China and many other South countries no longer contributed to global warming. Furthermore, their conclusions showed interpreting scientific data can be intensely political. These Agarwal-Narain conclusions raised a great deal of international controversy. The well-known US journal, Global Environmental Change, recently invited comment on environmentalists throughout the world on the global warming debate. We carry excerpts of the debate: