US biggest contributor of envt unsustainability: Jairam Ramesh

Describing the US as the biggest contributor of unsustainability, Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh Wednesday regretted that India and China were "hell-bent" on following the American model of development.

Ramesh, the former Environment Minister who is currently on UN Secretary General's panel of Global Sustainability, voiced his "frustration" with the committee as he apprehended that its report to be submitted in January next could be ignored by the US.

"The real drivers of unsustainability are in advanced countries and the big elephant moving in that room is the US. It does not want to even engage in the debate over sustainability," he said here while releasing UN Development Programme's Human Deveopment Index report 2011.

Referring to the Global Sustainability Committee, Ramesh said member countries to it are going to support their final report to the UN Secretary General on January 12, 2012.

"So we come out with a beautiful report on the 12th of January, which can be completely ignored by the US. It is really a pity because the US does more to contribute to unsustainability than any other single country in the world," he said.

He went on the add, "if the US had been the only country in the world doing this, it was manageable. But the US has such a powerful impact across the world that countries like China and India are hell-bent on following the American model. That is what is driving now increasingly unsustainability."

The Minister said it was "not just inequality between nations but also inequalities within nations that are very important."