Can villages help India achieve climate goals?

DW (English)

India's villages can play a key role in the fight against climate change. But will their slow progress and limited resources hinder hitting the carbon neutral goal, or will new technologies help them succeed?

Transcript

00:00Nearly 70% of India's population lives in villages.

00:09Experts say villages are key to net-zero carbon dioxide emissions.

00:13Could they be the key to helping India meet its carbon-neutral targets by 2050?

00:19But progress in villages is slower compared to cities, change is slow, and old habits

00:24die hard.

00:26Yet some rural areas have reduced their carbon footprint.

00:30How close will your village be to net-zero by 2050?

00:41Geeta Kumari is an 18-year-old woman who lives in Sirsa Machipur village near Uttar Pradesh's

00:47Noida city.

00:49About 2,750 people live here.

00:52It's not very far from the capital New Delhi, but lags behind in terms of development.

00:57Geeta is a science teacher at the village's secondary school.

01:00Today, she is teaching students how to convert temperatures from degrees Celsius to Fahrenheit.

01:06She is one of the very few women who completed her education here.

01:10Now she is preparing for medical school entrance exams to become a doctor.

01:18Most people in her village are involved in agriculture.

01:22They rely on non-renewable energy sources.

01:39Almost every village in India shares a similar story.

01:42But can they contribute to the country's net neutrality goals?

01:53Geeta Kumari is the head of climate change and water and air reform.

01:5865-70% of the population still lives in villages.

02:01But the problem of climate change and water and air reform has not been created by the

02:07village.

02:08It has been created by the people of the city, by the industry, by the big companies.

02:13Despite this, I would like to say that there are options.

02:17We can do a lot to reduce the impact of climate change.

02:22So what exactly is carbon net neutrality?

02:25When we talk about carbon neutrality, we first have to look at where greenhouse gases are

02:30coming from.

02:31And then either we use different technologies to reduce where they are coming from.

02:36Or we can use sequester, like carbon dioxide is absorbed in trees.

02:43We can plant more trees.

02:48Hi, my name is Shalu Agrawal.

02:51And I am an energy policy researcher.

02:56Bhartiya village, with the help of government and through community support,

03:00is making itself energy efficient.

03:03And at the same time, the way of life is changing.

03:08But in Geeta's village, many homes do not have electricity.

03:12For those who have it, it is irregular and costs a lot of money.

03:17There are many homes that do not have electricity.

03:20They are using candles and batteries.

03:22The village's literacy rates are low and school dropout rates are high.

03:27This is partly due to a lack of constant energy sources to allow children,

03:31especially girls, to study at home.

03:34The girls in our village have problems studying because they do not have electricity at home.

03:39That is why there should be proper light for them.

03:42There should be a facility that keeps the light on.

03:46There are more than 6 lakh villages in India.

03:49And almost two-thirds of India's population lives in villages.

03:54Which is why we say India lives in the villages.

03:56Despite having such a large population,

04:00the contribution of villages to India's energy demand is still only one-third.

04:06Between 2000 and 2020, about 800 million people

04:11who did not have electricity got electricity for the first time.

04:19This village Palli is now connected to a 200 kilowatt solar-powered mini-grid.

04:25Shruti Galhotra is 23 years old and is a software developer.

04:29She tells us how the mini-grid has transformed the lives of people in her village.

04:35When solar lights come on, they automatically keep on working.

04:38First it goes to the grid and then we get electricity.

04:42We can use all of it.

04:44We have motor pumps for water at home.

04:47And fans, lights, whatever we want to use.

04:51Refrigerator.

04:52We can use all of it.

04:55The electricity is coming from our solar panels.

04:58The Indian government has launched a very ambitious scheme.

05:01It is called PM Surya Ghar Yojana.

05:03And the objective of this scheme is to reach about 1 crore Indian homes with rooftop solar.

05:13All farmers in Geeta's village use heavy industrial pesticides on the crops for better yield

05:19and they grow water-intensive crops, such as rice.

05:22India is the second largest rice producer in the world.

05:25A significant share of the world's rice harvest is produced by wet rice cultivation like this.

05:31Besides its significant water footprint, wet rice cultivation is a large contributor to methane emissions.

05:55Once produce is grown, food storage presents another challenge for villagers.

06:00India wastes 74 million tonnes of food every year.

06:04A staggering loss of 10.8 billion US dollars, which makes it world's second biggest food waster.

06:11A big factor is the lack of cold storage facilities for the produce.

06:16Green Energy has helped solve this and brought Majolia village technological advancement.

06:24My name is Chanda Kumari.

06:26I am from Majolia village, Jaffa panchayat, Bochham block, Mujaffarpur district.

06:31I am a farmer.

06:36Earlier, I did not have a coal stove.

06:38Nor did I have one in my village.

06:41It was very far away, like in the city.

06:44We could not reach there.

06:46It would dry up after we brought it home.

06:49The next day, we would take it to the market.

06:52It would not be profitable.

06:54That is why my goods would get spoilt.

06:57After that, we got a coal stove.

07:01It is not powered by electricity.

07:04It is powered by solar energy, like sunlight.

07:07It is powered by solar energy, like sunlight.

07:15It does not spread carbon.

07:18It is not powered by electricity.

07:20It is powered by sunlight.

07:22It has good cooling.

07:24After getting solar energy,

07:26my goods and the goods of other farmers are not spoilt.

07:31They are safe.

07:34The village of Kapikona has also introduced innovative solutions to traditional ways of life

07:40in a bid to clean up air pollution and increase knowledge and care about the environment.

07:46My name is Anjana.

07:48I am coming from Kapikona village in Meenangadi.

07:54In Meenangadi, carbon neutrality mainly focuses on the emission sector and carbon sequestration.

08:00Here, in the emission sector, we are categorized into four major sectors.

08:04Energy, waste, afforestation and transportation sector.

08:09Here, we can identify the transportation and energy sector that will be contributing.

08:15We are mainly focusing the afforestation program like tree banging, oxygen park, green island.

08:21Here, around 40 varieties of bamboos were planted to initiate this school and supported by the panchayat.

08:29The farmers here plant trees, which are geotagged.

08:33The age and health of each tree is updated on an app.

08:37The village council office deposits a few rupees annually into the farmers' bank accounts for each tree,

08:44provided they do not cut them.

08:47In rural India, the traditional chulha stove is still widely used for cooking.

08:51But it comes at a steep cost to both people's health and the environment.

08:56In homes, the impact can be deadly.

08:59Household air pollution from dirty stoves and fuel claims the lives of 3.8 million people annually.

09:07The toxic smoke contains harmful gases like carbon dioxide, methane and fine particles that accelerate global warming.

09:16In Geeta's village, most women cook using these traditional chulhas with firewood and cow dung cakes.

09:23In Minangadi, some households are switching to cleaner fuel like biogas.

09:28This is a pit used for organic waste and the chamber converts the waste slurry over time to mainly methane and carbon dioxide.

09:37This tea is made on the gas supplied through pipes from a biogas plant.

09:49While there are solutions, there are gaps in their smooth implementation.

09:53Many solar pumps, cookers and biogas plants remain unused.

10:06We need to create a model that is scientifically good, but does not make the local people unable to understand it.

10:19We need to create a model with simple indicators.

10:23Local people should be able to understand the emissions from the economic activity we are doing.

10:31Not just a scientist or a bureaucrat will be able to run the whole process.

10:38Big technologies like solar, wind, biomass, agriculture, natural farming, everything requires finance.

10:48The government should provide subsidy, but programs cannot be scaled through subsidies.

10:53For this, we need to create a business model and affordable patient capital.

10:59Through this finance, we can make this technology accessible to the villages.

11:03Reducing the carbon footprint is also a big goal for meeting local climate action plans.

11:09Geeta wants her village to be clean.

11:12She wants people to reduce waste and keep their surroundings clean.

11:16Our village is getting polluted because the garbage is being thrown into the lake.

11:22In our village, there is a lot of cow dung and cow dung is also thrown into the lake.

11:30Water is also thrown into the lake.

11:33People go to the forest to use the toilet.

11:37In our village, toilets are not an option.

11:40Children get sick because of the pollution.

11:44Minangadi shows a path ahead here as well.

11:49We have achieved 100% waste management through the Haridakarmasena waste collection and segregation process.

11:58In each ward, two people are assigned to collect the waste at the household level.

12:05Primary separation is done at the household level.

12:08Then the waste is sent to the centralized segregation center in Minangadi panchayat.

12:14There we have done the process of shredding, baling and separation also.

12:20After the separation, we can identify the color plastic, white plastic, cardboard, thermocol, plastic bottles and glass bottles, etc.

12:32Will Geeta's carbon neutral dream for her village come true?

12:36My dream is that our future lives will be more clean.

12:41The roads should be wide and the pollution should not spread.

12:46And our water should be clean.

12:51The water from the lake should be clean.

12:55And there should not be any waste thrown into the lake.

13:00And there should be trees and plants around us.

13:04The use of fertilizers is important.

13:08Chemicals should not be used because they cause problems to the farmers.

13:18There is no proper light.

13:20There should be a proper light.

13:22There should be a facility where the light is on.

13:26There should be a gas facility for the women so that they do not have any problem in cooking.

13:32They can cook on the gas stove.

13:55www.globalonenessproject.org

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