Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd Managing Director and CEO Anish Shah recently supported incentives provided to companies by the government for promoting ESG (environmental, social and governance) programmes.
Speaking at the annual general meeting of the Indo Canadian Business Chamber, Shah also said climate change should not be seen as a potential disaster but “think of it as an opportunity”.
“The biggest factor in these programs (ESG) is new technologies because the new technologies are resulting in quantum changes in the carbon footprint,” he said when asked if there should be some sort of incentive by the government to promote or give a push to ESG programmes.
Citing the examples of electric vehicles (EVs) and solar energy, Shah said, “These are technologies that are creating quantum changes. So, that’s why incentives are essential. At the start, any of these technologies are not going to be economically competitive”.
On solar energy, he said 10 years ago the prices in India were very high but today it is one of the cheapest means of generating power.
“Without the incentives, and without the discoms coming in and taking solar power today, we would not have an industry that we have at this point in time. So, the incentives have been there,” he added.
Similarly, Shah said, “With electric vehicles, we’ve seen governments around the world give incentives. India has provided incentives in terms of lower GST and the new PLI policy that has come for EVs will drive much faster adoption and an incentive for auto companies to go to EVs at a fast rate”.
So that is starting to happen already, he said, adding “we will see that other technologies are coming up as well”.
Offering a different perspective to tackling climate change, Shah said, “…let’s not think of climate change as a potential disaster. Let’s think of it as an opportunity. There are a number of economic benefits from this”.
Elaborating, he said, “There are cost savings and there are new industries that are coming up. Electric vehicles, hydrogen, wind, solar energy, recycling, VC capital are available at lower costs for green initiatives. And this is an area where as corporates, we have to lead or perish”.
Stating that combating climate change will require a very concerted and sustained effort, Shah said, “It cannot be done in isolation. It cannot be done by anyone stakeholder, by the government alone, or by corporates alone. It has to be a coordinated effort across all of us across the world”.
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