Javadekar bats for sensitizing industries to make them adopt eco-friendly ways

Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar on Monday said industries need to be sensitized in innovative ways to make them work in an environmental-friendly way. He was speaking at an event to release a report 'Grain by Grain', prepared by the NGO Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) which has studied and assessed the environmental performance of the fertilizer industry in India.

"These studies help the government in good governance. The report has evaluated 42 parameters before finalizing the rankings (of fertiliser companies)," the minister said. Javadekar said for the efficient and environment-friendly fertilizer industry, incentives are important and they also need to be sensitized in new ways.

"Incentivising is important these days, it is a reality. We have to sensitize the industries in a new way for them to work in an environmental-friendly way," he said. CSE director general Sunita Narain said ratings recognize good performers and push the bad ones to improve.

"The rating process is robust and transparent and the outcomes of our ratings have been used by companies as well as policymakers to improve policies and practices," she said. According to the report under the Green Rating Project (GRP) of CSE, India's fertilizer industry performed well in curtailing its energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, but some slipped on water consumption and water pollution parameters.

"Some of the Indian companies match the global best. However, our rating finds that this sector has slipped on its water consumption and water pollution parameters - plants are also getting affected simply because of lack of water; their water sources are getting depleted and disappearing very fast," said Chandra Bhushan, Deputy Director-General, CSE. He said another major concern is the age of the plants - most of India's fertilizer plants are getting old.

"Though the sector still manages to perform reasonably well in meeting health and safety standards, most plants need to upgrade their onsite and offsite disaster management plans and communicate them to the authorities concerned and the local community," Bhushan said. The CSE also awarded fertiliser companies which secured top four positions by securing a high score on every parameter.

The top-rated plant was Grasim Industries Ltd's Indo Gulf Fertilisers unit at Jagdishpur in Uttar Pradesh. This plant, with 61 percent score, has received the Four Leaves award for its superior performance in energy use and GHG emissions, its good EHS (environment, health, and safety) measures, and social responsibility, and above all, its transparency in sharing information, the report said. In an extensive 18-month-long process, the fertilizer sector was rated on more than 50 parameters, the report said, adding that it covered all 28 operational plants in the country.

"Fifty-seven percent of the plants voluntarily participated in the rating by disclosing information and by allowing the GRP team to verify them on the site. The remaining plants were rated on the basis of information available in the public domain and stakeholder surveys. NFL and IFFCO, the biggest public sector companies, refused to voluntarily participate in the rating," the NGO added.