Technical Support to the U.T. of Puducherry for Strengthening Green Budgeting

This project aims to engage and support identified stakeholders through technical inputs on green budgeting for the Union Territory of Puducherry.

Environmental and climate policymaking at the sub-national level through state environment policies and action plans on climate change take place at longer intervals of time. In India, many states are revising their State Action Plan on Climate Change after a gap of almost a decade. Even fewer states/ UTs regularly prepare State of Environment Reports or have disaggregated state indicator frameworks on SDGs. This is where annual budget-making processes become important and provide and entry point for climate actions and SDGs to be considered as a part of the decision-making process on an annual basis. To break the silos and promote better integration of environmental goals and climate action between departments at the sub-national level, there is a need to improve the capacity of all the departments involved. Budgets are an important tool for ensuring policy coherence through mainstreaming sustainable development outcomes in economic policy and are an important means of implementation.

Green budgeting is a policy innovation that serves as a planning and assessment tool that can contribute to institutionalizing and integrating environmental sustainability in various government initiatives and promote a system-wide approach. Through ex-ante planning and ex-post reflection, departments need to reorient their goals, schemes, and policies to become more environmentally and climate-sensitive. By doing so, departments could also assess how much a particular department contributes to climate change.

The main objective of the initiative is to provide technical support to identified stakeholders to strengthen green budgeting at the institutional level. Building on the past work on green budgeting, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) aims to engage, and support identified stakeholders through technical inputs on green budgeting for the Union Territory of Puducherry.

The green budget of the Union Territory increased by 153% from INR 191 crores in the baseline year of FY 2022-23 to INR 483 crores in FY 2023-24. The percentage of the green budget in the identified schemes increased from 7.78% to 16.42%. As a share of total expenditure (revised estimates for FY 2022-23 and budget estimates for FY 2023-24), the green budget component increased from 1.66% to 4.17%. In the baseline year, 9 departments identified schemes and green components, while in FY 2023-24, 15 departments identified both schemes and green components. Regarding budget heads, the baseline year includes 120 heads, while for FY 2023-24, 134 budget heads were identified.

The Green Budget Report of the Union Territory of Puducherry for FY 2022-23 (baseline year) and FY 2023-2024 is a comprehensive document that outlines the green budget allocation, highlights sustainability initiatives, maps activities to promote environment-sensitive planning, accountability, aligns with the sustainable development goals, and provides valuable recommendations for departmental budgeting. It serves as a road map for fostering sustainable development and promoting a greener future in Puducherry. It is a sincere hope that the Union Territory of Puducherry champions the cause of environmental protection by further integrating environmental components in more budget line items by various departments.