130 SOCIAL SCIENTIST
It is commonplace that many economic policies, meant to stimulate growth, result in the natural resource-based sectors such as forests, fisheries or coir, getting entrapped in the market economy thereby losing their sustainability. It has to be realised that this process has been introduced into an economy with an utterly inequitable
consumption pattern especially with regard to natural resources. (Table 1).
The structure of consumption also shows that a considerable proportion of household consumption is for food. Food and clothing alone accounts for 63 per cent of household consumption (Table 2). One can, therefore, foresee how the inequitable consumption pattern with regard to natural resources and the subsistence patter in household consumption would be further aggravated by the resource-intensive economic growth advocated at present.
Table 2
Structure of Consumption (Percentage Share of Total Household Consumption)
Item Per cent
Food 52 Clothing and footwear 11 Gross rents fuel and power 10 Medical care 3 Education 4 Transport-Communication 7 Others 13
Source: World Development Report 1992, p. 236.
It is in this context that one could analyse the World Development Reports, 1992 and 2993. These documents epitomise the global trends in development and can be considered as a corollary of such trends. This paper, mainly concerned with environmental implications, is divided into two sections. In section I, some environmental assumptions and approaches of WDR 1992 and 2993 will be examined in relation to the existing policy framework in India. Section II attempts to elucidate the likely environmental impact as a result of the new economic policies.
The World Development Report 1992 carries the essence of World Bank's policy prescriptions for the environment. In this, the relation between population and environment obtains emphasis in consonance with the international discourse on environment. The prescription of the 1992 report is to promote rising incomes through growth models