In a first, the Kerala government has introduced an Environment Budget as a separate document along with the State Budget.
The Environment Budget was also tabled in the Assembly on Monday alongside other Budget documents. The document highlights 81 schemes in nine sectors and their Budget allocations in environment-related areas.
“This is a novel initiative towards the State’s commitment to integrating environmental concerns in its planning and implementation and it will be refined in the coming years,” Finance Minister K. N. Balagiopal said in his preface to the Environment Budget, a 59-page document.
The sectors selected for the first Environment Budget are agriculture, livestock, fisheries, forests and wildlife, environment, water resources, cooperation, soil survey, and the energy sector.
The total outlay for environment-related schemes in the Budget allocations for these sectors is approximately ₹668.88 crore for 2024-25.
In a nutshell, environmental budgeting refers to the process of “evaluating environmental impacts of budgetary and fiscal policies and integrating environmental concerns into the policies and programmes of the State,” the document noted. In the coming years, the exercise will be extended to more departments, according to the government.
Mr. Balagopal expressed the hope that the separate Environment Budget would help in mainstreaming environmental awareness and aid the assessment of expenditure in environment-related areas.
The LDF government originally intended the Environment Budget to be part of the 2023-24 budget. Kerala is already moving ahead with plans to turn into a 100% renewable energy-based State by 2040 and net carbon neutral by 2050. The State published the revised State Action Plan on Climate Change 2023-2030 (SAPCC 2.0) in December 2022.
