Davos: Microsoft Corporation chairman Bill Gates did not mind taking cudgels with world leaders when batting for India’s poor in the raging global debate on sustainable growth, where climate change clearly seems to be edging out growth and development, so critical to emerging economies.
"Climate change issues cannot be addressed by asking the poor to cut back on consumption. You can't get 90 per cent of carbon dioxide reduction by telling them to reduce their nutrition levels. You can't have a just world by asking them to use less energy," Gates said, responding to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who said climate change was the entry point for sustainable growth.
In his opening address at a session on "Redefining Sustainable Development" moderated by foreign affairs columnist Thomas Friedman, the UN Secretary-General was clear that the world needed sweeping changes and some out-of-box thinking to create growth in a resource-constrained environment. "One resource scarcest of all today is time," said Ban Ki-Moon.
According to Gates, the world population would grow by a factor of 1.5 over the medium-to-long term. "If we take care of a baby in the first 30 days, reproductive planning and vaccination is more important than the clamour for asking the poor in North India to cut back on their energy consumption. You can't ask a household to light one candle instead of two," he said.
Gates, like governments in most emerging economies, wants people to lead better lifestyles. "We don't want a situation where the bottom two billion of the population uses less energy. The poor will consume more food and more energy." He believes that the world needs a breakthrough to address the issues of climate change and clean energy. "But innovation gets underfunded. And food for poorest is the most underfunded," Gates said.
Friedman didn't lose this opportunity and quickly prodded leaders to react to US failure on innovation in clean technology.
"One of the biggest engines of innovation is the US economy. But climate change has become a four-letter word in the US. A clean energy bill in the US is likely only by 2013," he pointed out, prodding the panel comprising three heads of state (Finland, Indonesia and Mexico) and CEOs of two global corporations, RIM (of Blackberry fame) and Walmart Stores.
Pat came the reply from Mexican President Felipe Calderon. "Is the US doing enough? Answer is no. The US needs to be a leader," he said. Ban Ki-moon felt that the climate change challenge must be first addressed by the developed world: "The US and European countries have a moral responsibility. But President Obama is facing some difficulties in domestic politics. The US should be followed by China, India and Brazil."
Calderon and Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, heads of two emerging economies, subtly made it clear that growth was an imperative, even as it was possible to simultaneously take care of climate change. "It is a false dilemma that growth comes at the cost of sustainability. It is possible to promote growth and preserve nature," said Mexican President Calderon.
"From the perspective of developing countries, it is necessary to continuously grow and build stronger economic capacity over years. But, there is no contradiction between achieving economic growth and sustainable development," said Indonesian President Yudhoyono.
Global CEOs, however, had a slightly different perspective. President and CEO Walmart Stores Mike Duke said business should not be sitting and waiting for government to initiate action. For instance, he said, Walmart will soon launch the sustainability product index to understand the background of any product being sold through its stores.
RIM chairman and co-CEO Jim Balsillie said the world needs to be radically ambitious because despite all the good things business is doing, the problem is far worse that it was 20 years ago and is only getting worse. "We have to fundamentally rethink economics," he said.
Source: The Indian Express
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