Mayaram flays prohibitory pricing of green technologies

MUMBAI: Seeking to restart the debate over prohibitory pricing of green technologies, a top Finance Ministry official today said the poor should not be made to pay through their nose for sustainable technologies by the developed world.

Blaming the Western world for putting the onus of fighting climate change on the developing world, Economic Affairs Secretary Arvind Mayaram said it was ironical that the poor were made to pay for follies of the rich.

Mayaram said the developed world wanted "the developing countries not to use the fossil fuels like coal, lignite which are available...and use solar energy, or wind power etc., while the state-of-the-art technologies are with the developed countries."

Blaming the approach of the Western world for insisting on poor nations pay for better technologies, he said, "You pay for the intellectual property (developed by the West), you buy their technology, you use the technology, and you make your consumer pay more so that the world can be changed...

"The poor must pay more for cooling the earth," Mayaram, noted sarcastically while speaking at an event organised by Ficci and the Asian Development Bank.

Mayaram also expressed displeasure at the functioning of the multilateral agencies like World Bank and Asian Development Bank, saying theirs is a "mixed response" when it comes to helping developing countries vis-a-vis helping the richer ones.

"The response of the multilateral banks, financial institutions, whether it is the World Bank or the Asian Development Bank, has been mixed as far as the developing countries are concerned," he said, without going into the specifics.

Mayaram, however, said New Delhi expects a lot more help from the Asian Development Bank.

"There is a lot that we expect from the ADB. We believe it is our bank. It is our bank because it is in the region and we part-own the bank and, therefore, it is our bank."

New Delhi has been steadfastly stressing that the developing countries should not be considered at par with the developed world when it comes to signing climate change treaties, stating that growth rates would suffer.

Mayaram also said lack of access to technology is another reason for the slowing investment and trade growth.