Context
- July 2025: Brazil hosted the Global Conference on Climate and Health.
- Outcome: 90 nations drafted the Belém Health Action Plan (to be launched at COP30).
- India: No official representation — a missed opportunity to showcase its developmental and climate-health
integration strategies. - Significance: India’s welfare programmes demonstrate practical lessons in linking climate action with health
outcomes, offering a potential model for global replication.
Lessons from India’s Welfare Schemes for Climate-Health Action
1. Nutrition and Climate-Resilient Food Systems
- PM POSHAN scheme: Covers 11 crore children in 11 lakh schools.
- Integrates health, education, agriculture, and procurement.
- Promotes millets and traditional grains, addressing malnutrition and building climate-resilient food
systems.
2. Sanitation, Livelihoods, and Clean Energy
- Swachh Bharat Abhiyan: Improved sanitation, public health, and dignity; reduced environmental
contamination. - MNREGA: Restored degraded ecosystems through rural works.
- PM Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY): Promoted clean cooking fuel, reducing household air pollution and emissions.
Critical Insights for Climate-Health Integration
Political Leadership: Prime Ministerial backing ensures inter-ministerial cooperation and public engagement. Climate change framed as a health emergency can mobilise action.
Community Engagement: Cultural anchoring and grassroots participation were key in programme success. Climate action gains traction when aligned with health and livelihood benefits.
Institutional Strengthening: Leveraging ASHA workers, SHGs, municipal bodies, panchayats enhances credibility and ensures sustained local action.
Challenges in Implementing Intersectoral Climate-Health Policies
- Administrative & Structural Constraints: Siloed ministries hinder holistic planning; e.g., high LPG refill costs under PMUY due to commercial interests.
- Social & Cultural Barriers: Equitable access requires sustained outreach and education.
- Coordination Gaps: Health, environment, energy, and agriculture sectors often operate independently.
Three Pillars for Health-Anchored Climate Governance
- Strategic Prioritisation: Link climate action with immediate health benefits, e.g., clean cooking → women’s health.
- Procedural Integration: Mandate health impact assessments across sectors — energy, agriculture, transport, urban planning.
- Participatory Implementation: Communities respond better to tangible health outcomes (clean air, safe water) than abstract carbon metrics; local health workers can act as advocates.
India’s Path Forward
- Choice: Continue fragmented climate and health interventions or adopt a bold intersectoral model treating them as interconnected challenges.
- Opportunity: Leverage welfare programmes’ experience to develop a coordinated climate-health governance framework.
- Global Leadership: Effective integration can position India as a model for implementing the Belém Health Action Plan.
Conclusion
- India must embrace an integrated climate-health model by:
- Building on welfare programme experience.
- Strengthening leadership, institutional mechanisms, and community participation.
- Treating climate and health challenges as mutually reinforcing priorities.