With New Mumbai Plan, Aaditya Thackeray Creates A First For South Asia
NDTV
Drawing on inputs from officials, citizens, researchers and companies, Mumbai's plan lists changes across six domains.
Mumbai announced detailed plans to zero out carbon emissions by 2050, a target that puts it two decades ahead of India's national goal and makes it the first city in South Asia to set such a timeline.
In the plan announced Sunday, India's financial center, home to south Asia's biggest corporations, stock bourses and the central bank, has proposed exhaustive changes to the way it manages energy, water, air, waste, green spaces and transport for its 19 million residents.
"We don't have the luxury of time," said Aaditya Thackeray, environment minister of the state of Maharashtra of which Mumbai is the capital. Without intervention, the effects of climate change could cost India $35 trillion over the next 50 years.
India's richest city, Mumbai is also home to tremendous poverty, with slums and fishing villages along the southern coast that date to British rule. By 2050, rising sea levels are expected to flood those parts of the city. In total, unabated climate change could cost the city $920 million.
