1. God gives and forgives. Man gets and forgets.

2. The ‘I’ causes the effect.

3. Mantra=Om, Womantra=More.

©Sunil Malhotra. 2009.

Starting today ‘BlogQuotes’:

1. The only difference between ‘Leadership’ and ‘Management’ is that one creates a spark, and the other fights the fire.

2. The only mantra to learn – “Get out of your way”.

3. Be slow and steady in life yet hasten to fail.

© Sunil Malhotra 2009.

Two of my favourite subjects here – the fascinating global warming debate and India’s bollywood style negotiation script. Hopenhagen is around the corner and will make Kyoto passe. We love being underdogs because like our movies, the hero comes from behind in a good-over-evil victory lap while the crowd applauds his heroic antics.

Two wrongs don’t make a right, and I fully intend the pun.
US spews Greenhouse Gases (GHGs) into the atmosphere when India sleeps. [Pat on back .. I'm getting good at puns]Now India wants America to pay for their long and sinful polluting behaviour. And guess what, if they don’t, we’ll have an equal right to kill the planet first so we’re even. That’s the craziest example of serving our self interests I’ve come across. It’s almost like saying that since I just found out that my neighbour has been raping my mother for 20 years, the way to punish him is by killing my own mother.

So what was Jairam Ramesh, India’s Minister of State for Environment suggesting to Manmohan Singh?

[India must] delink itself from G77 — the 131-member bloc of developing nations — and take on greenhouse gas emission reduction commitments under a new deal without any counter guarantee of finances and technology.

Read the whole story here.

To further quote from India Insights [India's principled stance on the environment misses the point] 

Industrialised nations exported pollution to under developed countries, a luxury that India does not have, if pollution is to be caused it will be at home.In addition, given India’s important but unpredictable monsoons, shifts to the world’s climate will be felt directly, India’s crucial Himalayan glaciers are already under threat. India is more vulnerable than other countries, and remember climate change has been a catalyst for political unrest, and in cases war, consider Darfur.

So while developed nations need to act responsibly, India needs to engage with the process. Stability and long term economic development may depend on it.

Silo-based + self-serving + political narrowmindedness … you have the surest formula for creating an earth after humans. Add to that the mathematical models that led us to believe Nobel economists which led to the current financial black hole.

1. With just over 300 million people US continues to lead the charge in polluting the earth’s air and water. If India were to expect negotiation leverage based on per capita quota for pollution, we’d have a right to do a minimum of 3 times the damage the US has already caused. Let’s go for it guys!

2. Granted India to balance its spending between development and environment protection, but shouldn’t the development agenda include a prerequisite – sustainability?

The call I make is for a holistic and non-confrontational approach to negotiations. This is NOT a bid winning a contract. It must be our collective bid to SAVE OUR PLANET. [See what I meant by getting good at puns?]

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World Trade Centre, Rotterdam, 25th September 2009. Indo-Dutch collaboration summit focused on Industrial Design. Hmmm … (Design Crossover).

Why they invited me to speak is still somewhat of a mystery considering I dropped off the Industrial Design radar towards the end of the last millennium. I guess it could’ve been because my company, Ideafarms, has been able to maintain a growing relationship between India and Europe over the last 8 years through projects and partnerships with Dutch and German corporations.

I’ve never been a champion of networking – I’ve actually often criticised some of my friends for using networking to get ahead – but am quite overwhelmed having been in the midst of some of the most ‘conscious’ designers of today. Jeroen Raijmakers of Philips and Jos Oberdorf of NPK Design are inspiring to say the least. I’m grateful to Ruchita Puri for the opportunity to meet them at the event.

From whatever was presented, it looks like good design can be really good business. There’s a case to be made out for a design collaboration without borders. Couple of good reasons here …

1. European design reflects high quality, the idiom being minimalistic and functional. Whereas India’s design sensibilities are more embellished. Their combination will raise the aesthetic appeal without compromising design values.

2. Pure economic tenets come into play when we see the sheer number of people both on the supply side (design talent is plenty in India) and the demand side (India is emerging as one of the largest markets). Leveraging the ‘great Indian talent pool’ is an opportunity.

3. The life sensibilities of India’s cultural make-up have always been in the mould of sustainability, something the world has woken up to only recently. Add to this the rich craft-based traditions and you have a universal design paradigm that’s as powerful as Buddhism.

Jump into this conversation folks. You don’t want to be left out. Really!

 This post is India centric.

Thinking lag is a serious condition. I remember how the older folks used to tell us ‘in our times things were so much cheaper’. Look at how the Government patronises unsuspecting academia and students by announcing Goals 2020 and supports it with Funding 1920. It’s not even smart political thinking. Call it Politicalaggard thinking.

Mayawati will spend Rs. 2000 crores (USD 400 million) dotting the UP countryside with ego-stroking statues of herelf and her mock leather handbags while the Government announces 1 crore for business incubation. Here …

The government has now formulated a scheme to set up around 100 incubators in the country to encourage the development of new businesses. It has earmarked a budget of Rs 1.13 crore for 2007-08 for providing grants to 50 universities and training institutes for setting up these incubators!

[read the original evangelising here]. And don’t miss ‘proud’ exclamation mark. 

(W)hen we hear of government funding numbers hovering around 1 crore ($200,000) for 50-100 incubators - in today’s world – (gimme a break) we are forced to be mildly suspicious of the political intent (or lack of it) and the seriousness of such initiatives. It is one thing to give a grant to a professor for a research project and quite another in the context of serious entrepreneurship in the real world. What could a graduating engineer contemplate creating with such a paltry sum which includes his livelihood as well. Let’s get real guys!

So here’s the deal.

1. First bring the academia out of the safety of the cocoons we’ve woven around them. Have them check out what the world looks like. Today’s world. Today’s India.

2. Next, focus towards incubating ‘people’. They should be the real focus. Find real mentors. People that have been in the entrepreneurial world even if they have failed. They are the best teachers. Not professors of colleges. Don’t talk about incubating business. Leave that to the Western world. Yes America’s a part of that set whether they accept or not.

3. Next, teach people to fish. No point in teaching fishing in your living room aquarium. At least walk them out to a brook. Pick up all the university incubation centres and physically put them off campus. That’s where the world exists. Not in the time warped government funded institutes.

Entrepreneur-ism is not socialistic. And capitalism doesn’t necessarily mean greedy or mercenary - especially in the context of India’s ethos. Make entrepreneurship an attractive lifestyle and stop being condescending irrespective of the preamble of our constitution. That goes for all those holier-than-thou bankers and VC’s.

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Now this is innovation,

- disrputive, passion driven and socially responsible, sustainable & non-capitalistic - not what management gurus are touting.

Chewang Norphel, Director of the Leh Nutrition Project.

Glaciers are the sole source of fresh water for the Buddhist farmers who make up more than 70% of the population in this rugged range between Pakistan and China. But rising temperatures have seen the icy snow retreat by dozens of feet each year — to find evidence of global warming, the farmers simply have to glance up from their fields and see the rising patches of brown where, once, all was white. Knowing no alternative, they pray harder for rain and snow.

But Chewang Norphel has gone beyond prayer. The 73-year-old civil engineer has come up with a solution that won’t exactly save the ancient glaciers, but it could stave off a looming irrigation crisis.

Norphel has created artificial glaciers, frozen pools of glacier run-off perched above the farmers’ fields … [read the full article here].

Highlights:

I’m so inspired …

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Image via Wikipedia

Now that you’ve fallen prey to my catchy title, don’t be fooled - the connections are not so remote as they appear at first glance. For those who have guessed, don’t spoil the fun.

Going by all known accounts, research information and the seemingly urgent political summits on the horizon – no points for guessing – climate change is being caused and accelerated only by one single species, humankind. So if stricter birth laws could be enforced, less human beings would be allowed to come into our planet and therefore would do less damage. (This would not hold if you included investment bankers and Nobel economists as being a part of humankind).

Here’s a sample from my proposed enactment -
“The Birth Control and Literacy for Climate Change Act, 2009″.

Article 12: Whereas the minority religions of the world seek to remove all obstacles (including, but not limited to, the outdated institution of marriage) for bringing into this world;
(a) by conscious,  unconscious or accidental act of momental ecstasy, and

(b) performed between two or more persons of same (Section 377 of IPC) or opposite sexes; and  

(c) through physical or artifical means,

such an occurence may be permitted a maximum of 2 times in the lifetime of each of the persons involved, jointly or severally without exception.

And as for my literacy angle, it’s simple enuff … really!

If people could not read, how would they know what to make of the law, let alone follow it. I wonder why India’s population continues to triple every 50 years.

Polulation

Adult Literacy

‘What about the so-called low-population, literate parts of the world?’
The ones they call developed.

Ah! That’s the other piece of the jigsaw. Going by the rate at which they pollute, consume, waste, destroy per capita … literacy is limited in its usefulness, merely to understanding the law and not practicing it. And expecting the rest of the world to practice what they preach while they go about their capitalism routinely.

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Climate change questions aren’t just math puzzles! So let me take a page from Conor F’s playbook and list some of the reasons why I don’t know how to make sense of global climate change. Here are seven (!):

• Compare-and-contrast reading on climate change (jamesfallows.theatlantic.com)

Image via Wikipedia

Over the weekend, my wife was reading my last blog post [Climate Change Bollywood Ishtyle] and, at the same time, Paulo Coelho’s – The Winner Stands Alone. I suspect she may have been hoping against hope that his literary talent will rub off on me through her! And guess what, she suddenly found herself reading about his take on climate change. Synchronicity? Disbelievingly I listened as she read out the following lines that, Coelho – through one of the central characters [Hamid] – professes. His take is quite the antithesis [counterpoint] of my view. It cannot be too good for my ego to even consider such a course but there’s something in there that’s worth a closer look. I have reproduced the lines here …

I know this sounds crazy guys, but I can’t help agreeing with him. Sorry Mr. Ego, you’ll have to eat humble pie this time!!

Image via Wikipedia

Let’s use the standard Hindi movie formula of circa 1980 to script our earth’s climate story. Enter Superstar  US. The virtuous, street smart, Robin Hood inspired protagonist of our story, replete with his coterie of jazz dancers. And then there’s the poor guy, India. Always trying to emulate the “hero” and competing with him for the “herione’s” attention in college settings. Let’s throw in some masala – subplots, love triangles and the very popular song and dance sequences – with the extras doing their own thing while they dance in the third row.

Quick Gun Murugan

Now compare this with whatever we’ve been seeing in the Climate Change discussions. See the script accurately playing itself out? (Nobody seems to want to ask mother Earth for her point of view). Call it clairvoyance or just plain sensitivity, some of us have been seeing it coming since the mid nineties. Even we couldn’t have guessed the speed of deterioration, although fully knowing the bounty hunter tendencies of the US, we should have been able to. Easily. Shame on us!

Some simple facts from Prem Shankar Jha’s Tehelka article, An Earth On Edge.

1. Till as recently as five years ago, abrupt climate change was on the unthinkable fringe of possibilities predicted by climate scientists. In March 2009, 2,500 scientists from 80 countries assembled at the International Scientific Congress on Climate Change in Copenhagen. The congress concluded that the findings of the IPCC were out of date. The evidence collected since its fourth report was compiled showed that global warming was ceasing to be human-induced and was becoming self-reinforcing.

2. The mean air temperature was also rising faster than had been predicted. Five years earlier, scientists had thought that the rise, currently at about one degree celsius from the beginning of the century, could be contained at around two degrees by the end of the present century. But fresh evidence showed that this is more wish than prediction. A three degree rise is now well on the cards.

3. They also found that the Greenland ice sheet, the Arctic ocean ice cap and the Antarctic shelf were melting faster than even the most determined pessimists had predicted. The rate of ice-melt in the Arctic in the summer of 2008 was what the IPCC had predicted for 2055!

I’m scared shitless!

Now for COP15. Copenhagen or “Hope-nhagen” planned in December 2009.

The wish for clarity is expressed by Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), in an interview with Environment & Energy Publishing (E&E). According to Yvo de Boer, the four essentials calling for an international agreement in Copenhagen are:

1. How much are the industrialized countries willing to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases?
 
2. How much are major developing countries such as China and India willing to do to limit the growth of their emissions?
 
3. How is the help needed by developing countries to engage in reducing their emissions and adapting to the impacts of climate change going to be financed?
 
4. How is that money going to be managed?

“If Copenhagen can deliver on those four points I’d be happy,” says Yvo de Boer.

Back to Prem Shankar Jha’s article for some answers:

… three key messages to the world. First, the worst case scenarios of the IPCC are being realised. For many key parameters, the climate is already moving beyond the patterns of natural variability within which our society and economy have developed and thrived. Second, the evidence being provided by the research community increasingly supports the possibility that the earth will experience ‘dangerous climate change’. And finally, action has to be drastic, immediate and coordinated. “Rapid, sustained, and effective mitigation based on coordinated global and regional action”, they warned, “(is) required to avoid dangerous climate change, regardless of how it is defined”.

In Mr. Yvo de Boer’s own words the answer to the first question about the role of industrialised countries …

“My big lesson from the Kyoto era is that it’s really important that the government delegation that represents the United States is in close touch with the Senate, with the elected officials on what’s acceptable and what’s not,” says de Boer, and he adds:

“I think that a major shortcoming of Kyoto was that the official delegation came back with a treaty they knew was never going to make it through the Senate. And this time I have the feeling that the communication is much stronger, that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, through John Kerry, is really expressing strongly what they feel needs to be done in Copenhagen.”

Yvo de Boer thinks the Kyoto Protocol was rejected by the US for mainly two reasons. Firstly, because it did not involve action on the part of major developing countries. Secondly, because it was felt by the Bush administration that Kyoto would be harmful to the US economy.

… amplified by Mr. Jha,

The Kyoto Protocol had required the industrialised nations to reduce their CO2 emissions by 6.4 percent below 1990 by 2000. But the Waxman-Markey bill requires American industry to bring energy-related CO2 emissions down by 20 percent below the 2005 level by 2020.This not only means that the US wants to shift the base year to 2005, but that the actual target for 2020 is only 4.6 percent below the 1990 level and lower than the original target it had accepted for 2000.

On the topic of India and China, here goes.

The developing country exception proved to be a poison pill. The Bush administration made it a pretext for withdrawing from the Kyoto Protocol in 2001. The European countries made a half-hearted attempt to honour their obligations. But with the US, Russia, China, India and other developing nations making no effort to curb emissions, the protocol did next to nothing to reduce CO2 emissions. For the world as a whole, energy-related CO2 emissions rose from 22 billion metric tonnes (BMT) in 1990 to 29.9BMT in 2007.

China was the main offender. Between 1990 and 2007, its CO2 emissions rose from 2.3BMT to a staggering 5.9BMT. This was only 0.2BMT less than the emissions of the US. But in the very next year, China surpassed the US when it commissioned 90,000MW of coal-fired power plants and added another half billion tonnes of CO2 to the atmosphere. India’s emissions have also grown rapidly, although from a much smaller base. These went up from 0.0006BMT in 1990 to 1.5BMT in 2007. Not surprisingly, neither country is pushing the developing country exception anymore.

And now for the most important part of our Bollywood script -

The aftermath of L’Aquila clearly shows that the rich nations have cast India in the role of the villain. The July 13 issue of The Economist carried an intemperate attack on Shyam Saran, Dr Manmohan Singh’s special envoy on global warming. Less than a week later the New York Times carried an editorial that must rank as the most virulent attack that it has launched on India since the liberation of Goa. The editorial linked its recalcitrance on global warming to a determination to misuse the Indo-US nuclear deal to make more nuclear weapons and missiles and the singlehanded sabotage of the Doha round of trade negotiations.

This concerted attack is not only totally unwarranted but casts doubts on the Western media’s much vaunted claim to freedom and objectivity. For although 37 countries, including China, have opposed the US and EU’s proposals, neither newspaper made even a token attempt to find out where the differences lie. And neither of them has gone after China.

In Hindi movies the “Hero” always wins in the end – good over evil! And the police lands up afterwards.

I met a classmate a couple of weeks ago after 20-odd years. He’s doing stuff at the leading edges of – you guessed it  - IPTV. The passion with which he explained the potential of the technology, and what it could do, sucked me into a discussion of fancy features; about how we could provide seamless interactivity with the back ends of Amazon, Walmart, Nike, D&G, etc. and how people could order pizzas from the comfort of their TV couches without as much as lifting a finger (after all, you’d only have to press a couple of buttons on the remote handset to achieve the impossible).

Whoa! Not so fast folks. The next time you are relaxing and watching your favorite TV program — think!

Think about the wonderful technology that has made our lives so entertaining. You can now recline in your favorite couch, sip a drink and munch away at crispies. Think about the power of surfing through channels with your beautifully contoured remote handset. With IPTV, the possibilities are endless at least at this point in time. Think about how our forefathers missed out on this marvel of technology. Think! Because our minds are all powerful and they have taken us over. 

Perhaps we tech things for granted!

It sure must make us feel great? Superior? Powerful? … empty? Huh! whawasthat??? 

Think about what it took to get this technology to your fingertips. Think about the enormous quantities of that wonder material called plastic that got dumped in landfill and rendered the land sterile for all times. Think of the effluents it generated during its manufacture and got dumped in the ocean for marine consumption. Think about the marvel of the printed circuit board and the fact that it just cannot be recycled, biodegraded or anything like that. Only dumped!! 

My concern for the “softer” issues has grown and is reaching urgent proportions.  I can ’feel’ their presence whichever way I turn. Their manifestations however, I cannot touch, smell, taste, see or hear. I believe these issues require “hard” insights and decisions and each one of us acting in global concert. 

Strangely enough, the “softer” the issues, the harder I find to wish them away. And even more curious is the fact that I cannot find a way to resolve them through our proven, erstwhile as well as current, business philosophies and methods. The issues loom large and threaten the very existence of our planet and consequently, humankind. 

The issues I’m bringing into focus are about ecology preservation, environmental friendliness, recycling potential, biodegradability, resource replenishment, alternative energy and sustainable development.  Big words that have high jargon potential and are becoming fashion statements in social and political (G5 Summits) gatherings. 

At the heart of these issues is an attitude. The attitude that the power of money bestows. Of possessing before belonging. Of usurping before sharing. Of depleting before replenishing. Without even an iota of guilt or remorse. Thereby fueling the mindless race for material acquisition.

I for one have clearly understood that the earth’s resources are finite and will soon run out if this mindless consumption is not stopped. What we choose to take from nature into our service will have to be returned in some form. And believe me, the time for theorising or mustering majority support is already behind us. The mushroom of the last two decades has already crept upon us and it is for us to find alternatives that will plan future preservation. 

Degradation of environment reflects a degeneration of human values. 

Why is the world …

… HyperTexting, HyperSurfing, HyperReacting ….  HYPERLIVING !!! 

Borrowing the words of Mahatma Gandhi - ‘the Earth has enough to satisfy the need of all the people, but not for satisfying the greed of some.’

<Everything> we’re doing is </Nothing.>

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