Myanmar’s natural assets – including its forests, soils and coastal waters and the biodiversity they embody – makes up its natural capital, providing critical benefits to the Myanmar people.
Benefits are helping to protect them against natural hazards and ensuring reliable sources of clean water for drinking and irrigation as well as opportunities for ecotourism. The assessment presented in this report shows where and how Myanmar’s natural capital contributes to clean and reliable drinking water sources, reduced risks from floods inland and storms along the coasts, and to maintaining the functioning of reservoirs and dams by preventing erosion. The results highlight areas that provide high levels of ecosystem services, where natural capital provides the greatest benefits to people and infrastructure. The natural capital assessment provided here can support development and management decisions that launch Myanmar on a more sustainable and inclusive path toward economic development.
Global marine fisheries are in crisis. The proportion of fisheries that are fully fished, overfished, depleted, or recovering from overfishing increased from just over 60 percent in the mid-1970s to about 75 percent in 2005 and to almost 90 percent in 2013. Biological overfishing has led to economic overfishing which creates economic losses. To quantify the value of this economic loss, in 2009 the World Bank and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO) published a study on the economic performance of global fisheries, The Sunken Billions: The Economic Justification for Fisheries Reform.
This study comprehensively examines the manufacturing supply chain of different components used in RE (renewable energy) systems, especially wind and solar technology, in India. Over the past one and half years, around 90 interviews were conducted across the solar and wind industry comprising manufacturers, developers, system integrators, academicians and policy makers. A sourcing strategy for these components has been identified based on macroeconomic criteria, material and resource constraints, techno-economic feasibility and international market dynamics. The report also proposes necessary policy and regulatory interventions to expand the supply of RE and create a demand-side pull.
The Government of India (GoI) initiated the "100 Smart Cities Mission" in 2014. This has triggered deliberations across the country on the concept of smart cities, the need and the orientation of the Mission in the context of India’s present urbanisation scenario. The concept of a "Smart City" is a relatively new phenomenon in India. This report is a step towards synthesising various aspects related to smart cities that has led to the formation of a proposed Reference Framework by CSTEP, for the Smart Cities Mission in India. The report is expected to guide policy makers and urban practitioners in making critical decisions, in an accountable manner and spirit, which will truly make Indian cities smart.
The report begins by carving out the following scope, for India:
India and other countries are expected to submit their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) for the Conference of Parties (COP-21) in December 2015. Keeping in mind the expectation that India will experience severe impacts from global warming and the fact that a large proportion of people still require basic needs and energy services, CSTEP conducted a study examining two scenarios for India’s development by 2030: policy or Business as Usual (BAU) and Sustainable Development (SD) or quality of life.
The study builds on the India Energy Security Scenarios (IESS) 2047 tool developed by NITI Aayog by adding a ‘quality of life’ dimension to the energy and emissions pathways.