In Glasgow, While more than 80 world leaders recently took an oath to slash their methane emissions by over 30 per cent by the year 2030, India couldn’t swear a similar oath because of its trade and agriculture-related concerns.
The Agricultural sector makes up 20.2 per cent of the Indian economy and more than half of India’s population is employed in it too, hence the choice by the Indian Prime minister to go for a slower approach in slashing the emissions while slowly reducing emissions in the Agricultural sector was a very wise decision.
Indian Livestock is an integral part of the Indian agricultural economy according to the 20th livestock census India currently has over 535.78 million livestock. This livestock is responsible for 78 per cent of the 24 million tons of methane emitted by the Indian economy.
Hence, any sudden change to slash the methane emissions would adversely affect the Indian agricultural economy as a whole. Hence only small and gradual changes would be effective in curbing the methane emissions in India, As most of the methane is generated via the digestive systems and manure of livestock.
Methane Gas is definitely one of the prime reasons for global warming as over the first 20 years after it enters the atmosphere, methane has more than 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide. Despite CO2 having a longer-lasting effect than, methane. It surely does heat up the atmosphere a lot in the short term. It is also responsible for at least 25% of today's warming.
In terms of trade an Indian official who didn’t want to be named stated that "Since our international trade is increasingly becoming a big part of our economy, we clearly did not want any clause on trade".
18.43% is the percentage that International Trade contributes to the Indian GDP and hence any clause related to climate change that might affect it should be taken with a pinch of salt, and only slow weaning of the Indian economy off fuels that produce Methane and CO2 in large batches is recommended.
However, the decision by the Indian prime minister to decrease the emissions by a billion tonnes by 2030 is more realistic and if achieved on time can help us as an economy to move towards our goal of achieving net-zero before or by 2070 more feasible.
