The National Environment Policy 2006

In one line

The National Environment Policy 2006 is the general environmental policy of India, and its eleven principles include the public trust doctrine, the polluter pays principle and legal liability, stated as Government policy rather than as judicial doctrine.

In the wording a student can write in an exam: the National Environment Policy 2006, approved by the Cabinet and issued by the Ministry of Environment and Forests, is India's general statement of environmental policy. It builds on the National Conservation Strategy and the Policy Statement for Abatement of Pollution of 1992 and on the sectoral policies. It states seven objectives and eleven principles, and it sets out strategies for regulatory reform, for enhancing and conserving environmental resources, for standards, for clean technology, and for education and information.

The seven objectives

Section 3 of the Policy, and they are worth learning because they are a complete statement of what Indian environmental policy says it is for.

1. Conservation of critical environmental resources. To protect and conserve critical ecological systems and resources, and invaluable natural and man-made heritage, which are essential for life support, livelihoods, economic growth and a broad conception of human well-being.
2. Intra-generational equity: livelihood security for the poor. To ensure equitable access to environmental resources and quality for all sections of society, and in particular to ensure that poor communities, which are most dependent on environmental resources for their livelihoods, are assured secure access to those resources.
3. Inter-generational equity. To ensure judicious use of environmental resources to meet the needs and aspirations of the present and future generations.
4. Integration of environmental concerns in economic and social development. To integrate environmental concerns into policies, plans, programmes and projects for economic and social development.
5. Efficiency in environmental resource use. To ensure efficient use of environmental resources, in the sense of reduction in their use per unit of economic output, so as to minimise adverse environmental impacts.
6. Environmental governance. To apply the principles of good governance, being transparency, rationality, accountability, reduction in time and costs, participation and regulatory independence, to the management and regulation of the use of environmental resources.
7. Enhancement of resources for environmental conservation. To ensure higher resource flows, comprising finance, technology, management skills, traditional knowledge and social capital, for environmental conservation.

Notice objectives 2 and 3. Intra-generational equity comes before inter-generational equity, and it is expressed as livelihood security for the poor. That is the Brundtland priority written into Indian policy, and it is the answer to any suggestion that Indian environmental policy is indifferent to distribution.

The eleven principles

Section 4. A candidate should be able to name at least seven and to say something about four.

i. Human beings are at the centre of sustainable development concerns. They are entitled to a healthy and productive life in harmony with nature. That is Rio Principle 1, reproduced.