Malaysia has gained notoriety as the bad boy of climate change. Not only has it gained entry into the league of the 30 most recalcitrant nations in terms of adversely impacting global warming , Malaysia’s total carbon dioxide emission has also tripled over the years.

As pointed out by Dr Richard Leete, the resident representative of the UN Development Programme in Kuala Lumpur yesterday (29 Nov), “Malaysia’s human development index had improved to 0.811 over 0.805 previously, putting the country in the category of ‘high development’ for the second time.”

“With increased prosperity and greater urbanization, Malaysia will undoubtedly continue to adopt the carbon-intensive lifestyle of developed countries. This implies increased carbon emissions from an ever-growing number of automobiles, factories, and power plants,” he said when releasing this year’s UNDP Human Development Report 2007/2008 –Fighting Climate Change.

How bad is it? Not too bad at first glance. According to UNDP’s tabulations, Malaysia is in the #26 slot out of 30. The real bad guys are U.S.A., China and Russia, India and Germany. Indonesia (#14) and Thailand (#22) are worse off than Malaysia.

But Malaysia may be faring worse off, according to Leete, if we look at the figures in terms of the population size. Indeed, per capital CO2 emissions for Malaysia had worsened from 3.0 tonnes to7.5 tonnes over 14 years from 1990 to 2004. Malaysia is the only country out of the top 30 polluting nations to have more than doubled its CO2 emissions over this period.

In absolute terms, Malaysia’s CO2 emission tripled from 55 metric tonnes in 1990 to 177 MT in 2004 over 14 years. In terms of percentage increase, this is a 221% jump. This compares to a 25% increase for U.S.A. and 109% for China, the two top polluters in absolute terms.

Malaysia only accounts for only 0.4% of the world’s population but it accounts for 0.6% of global emissions. The report pointed that if the whole world were to emit CO2 at the rate Malaysia is doing, we can then all kiss goodbye to sustainable development.

This begs the question-what are we doing about it? The simple answer is that we are long on rhetoric and very, very short on action.

It is not as if the government has not bothered. “The principles of sustainable development have been gradually integrated into national development policies at the highest levels of planning and policy making,” Datuk Sri Mohd. Effendi Norwawi, Minister in the PM’s Department said in his speech read out by someone else at the same function.

He went on to say that the government has been “aggressively promoting the adoption of renewable resources” and that the government has also begun to formulate a national framework to address the climate change issues in accordance to the country’s developmental priorities.

Prof Datuk Noor Azlan Ghazali, who read out the minister’s speech and who is also director of the Malaysian Development Institute which is under the Economic Planning Unit which is under the Prime Minister’s Department, disclosed that the government is also coming up with a sustainable development index but at the moment it’s still under wraps.

Malaysia World Wildlife Fund president, Tan Sri Razali Ismail who was also present was less inclined to be patient: “No more jaw jaw. I hope we don’t go to Bali (next week for another round of United Nations climate change talk shop) and be caught up in endless debates.”

“I have no doubt about the government’s commitment but this must be matched by its ability to come up with enforcement and delivery structures. “

He also took business and industry to task for their tokenism about corporate social responsibility.

“Come down hard on those who break the rules, those who waste resources and those who practise such bad habits,” so says the WWF man.

And he is right. Time for cakap cakap is over. Climate change is far too important to for making small talk. As the report points out, climate change is already starting to affect some of the poorest and most vulnerable communities around the world. Climate change is a massive threat to human development and in some places it is already undermining world efforts to reduce extreme poverty.

It is true that the rich countries lead the pack of CO2 transgressors as they are responsible for nearly half of all CO2 emissions although they only account for 15% of the world’s population. But Malaysia has not business to act like a bad guy too. In fact, it looks like it is aspiring to do just that. (By BOB TEOH/ MySinchew)