• Skua@kbin.earth
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    6 days ago

    There are more people in India than in Africa, it shouldn’t be that surprising for India to also produce more emissions. However, going by your source India produced less than Africa in total and quite a bit less than the US in total in 2023, the most recent year it shows

    India’s rate of increase is alarming, I agree with that. I just don’t think it’s very reasonable to criticise them in the same breath as the US, China, or Europe when they are so much less polluting per person and also suffering the impacts of climate change so much more

    • PhilipTheBucket@ponder.cat
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      6 days ago

      I don’t really care about per person. I’m concerned about where the problems in the world are, so they can be fixed.

      I’m not saying the Indians are sinning for creating carbon emissions. I am saying that India forming a large part of the world’s emissions – and, in particular, that fact that its emissions are still rising sharply which even the US has managed not to do – means that it’s worth paying attention to.

      I had thought that India surpassed Africa last year, but I can’t find the numbers. Maybe I am wrong.

      For another way to look at it, look at this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita

      • United States: 13 tons per capita per year, down 34% since the year 2000
      • China: 9 tons, up 223% since 2000
      • India: 2 tons, up 119% since 2000
      • European Union: 8 tons, down 32% since 2000

      Maybe that’s more of a complete / more accurate picture, in terms of what everyone’s doing and what directions everything is moving.

      • Skua@kbin.earth
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        6 days ago

        Based on the rate of increase I can certainly believe that India passed Africa in 2024. It’s close and India is rising while Africa isn’t

        I think we do need to consider per capita, though, because in any fair world we should probably all share a somewhat similar level of responsibility. GHGs don’t care about national borders. If we reach a global net zero, that shouldn’t mean that Belgian people all still drive petrol cars just because Belgium is a small portion of the global population, right? And at the same time, I’m certainly not keen on trying any sort of directed birth control policy on a global scale because there’s just no way that turns out well