Concern for Global Warming among Professionals in Urban India

Abstract

Global warming is an important concern nowadays. Government and non-government organizations are trying to build awareness among the people to contain this problem. A study was done to understand the concern for global warming among the working class of urban India. A sample of 1,220 respondents representing a cross section of Indian urban working class were interviewed to check their awareness of global warming and activities undertaken by them and other agencies to reduce the global warming. The study found that around two-thirds of the urban working class is aware of global warming, but their actions were confined only to activities which benefited them monetarily. The respondents felt that their organizations are contributing towards protecting the environment; however, they felt that the government and international bodies need to do more. The study also supports the earlier studies which found that demographic variables are not good variables to differentiate environmental behaviour.

Keywords

Global warming urban India

Introduction

Ren and Lin (2001) compare global warming to a ‘monster’. IPCC (1992) states that the greenhouse gases emitted through various human activities cause global warming. Gore (1993) believes that ‘global warming is the most severe threat human species has ever faced’. Governmental and nongovernmental agencies are working to educate the people about global warming.

National Cadet Corps (NCC) spread awareness about evils of global warming and significance of environment at a programme on the Independence Day of India at the Banaras Hindu University (TNN 2010). Students from various schools and colleges have come together to create sand sculptures in Chennai to spread awareness of global warming (DNA 2010). Daljeet Singh travelled across India on his bicycle spreading the message of Go-Green (D’Souza 2012). He said ‘if everyone minimizes the use of plastic and motor vehicles, one can help in reducing global warming.’ Indian Air Force organized a 2000-km rigorous cycle expedition across India to spread awareness on global warming. (TNN, 2011)

Gautier and Fellous (2008) suggested the following five elements for a long-term strategy:

saving energy and developing new and efficient technologies;

cleaner technologies for electricity generation;

reducing transportation sector emissions;

developing renewable sources of energy; and

getting ready for the indispensable adaptation to future challenges in the climate system.

Literature Review

Global warming has become an important concern nowadays, even though scientists had identified it as a potential problem as early as1896 (Dispensa & Brulle, 2003). Andrew (2011) states that the widely accepted view is that global warming is man-made and largely caused due to carbon dioxide (Financial Express, 2002). The current global emission reduction efforts are centred on the Kyoto Protocol (UNFCCC, 1997) adopted in Kyoto, Japan, on 11 December 1997 and ratified by 184 countries (Vazhayil, Sharma & Balasubramanian, 2011).

While Leonidou, Leonidou and Kvasova (2010), doPaço and Raposo (2009) and Svensson and Wagner (2012) state that there is a general increase in the awareness about the impacts of global warming and that there has been an increase in the understanding regarding the causes of global warming (Dembkowski & Hanmer-Lloyd, 1994), Brechin (2003) states that many people across different nations are largely uninformed about the problem.

In a study, Newing (2011) found 74 per cent of consumers say that they prefer green products but only 30 per cent are interested in purchasing green products. Similarly, Bonini and Oppenheim (2008) in an eight-country study found that 87 per cent of consumers were concerned about environmental issues; however, only 33 per cent stated that they either have purchased green products or have the intention of doing so. Polonsky, Garma and Grau (2011) suggest that this behaviour could be because the information about global warming is complex and an average consumer may have difficulty in understanding it, regardless of country. Luzio and Lemke (2013) found no variation in socio-demographic variables with respect to consumption of green products.

Research Framework

Research has stated the ‘need for marketing research to address the divide between attitudes toward green products and actual purchase behaviours’ (Cronin, Smith, Gleim & Martinez, 2011). There is therefore a need to focus on the complete decision process (Peattie, 2001). This article would adopt the environmental consciousness framework suggested by Pingali (2014) to understand the concern for global warming (Figure 1).

Figure 1.

Source: Adopted from Pingali (2014).

Bhuian, Doughlas and Sharma (2014) state ‘educated consumers are likely to be higher on environmental behavior’; therefore, as a first step, this article aims at understanding the concern of global warming among the professionals working in private sector in urban India.

Urban India

India is one of the more vulnerable and multi-hazard risk prone countries in the world (IFRC, 2005; Parasuraman & Unnikrishnan, 2000). Climate change risk to India should be seen in the perspective of an ongoing demographic transition that will see India’s population stabilizing at about 1.6 billion in the 2060s along with a high rural–urban transition (McGranahan et al., 2007).

India has the 2nd largest urban system in the world, with 310 million people in over 5,161 cities. According to Hughes and Hillenbrand (2006), India will experience one of the most dramatic settlement transitions in history over the next 40-odd years as its urban population grows from about 300 to over 700 million. India could by mid-century have both the largest national urban and rural populations. By 2025, 70 Indian cities are expected to have more than 1 million inhabitants (Centre for Education and Documentation [CED], 2010).

Urban India also overtook rural India in its gross domestic product (GDP) share in the late 1990s. This income skew has been accentuated by recent rapid economic growth in the city-based services and manufacturing sectors, thereby increasing urban India’s contribution to global warming. Thus, there is an urgent need for the society to act against global warming.

Research Questions

The research aims at understanding the following:

Is the urban working class concerned about global warming?

Actions taken up by urban working class in protecting the environment.

The perception urban working class has on the extent to which different agencies are protecting the environment.

Sampling

A total of 1,220 respondents, covering a cross section of target group (professionals working in private sector in urban India) from different cities in India, were interviewed by the students of a premier management school in India during their summer internship.

Of the respondents, 70 per cent were male and the remaining were females. While a third of the respondents were in the age of 20–30 years, around 50 per cent of the respondents were in the age of 30–40 years and the balance were above 40 years. Of the respondents, 80 per cent were graduates and the remaining were postgraduates. Table 1 shows the breakup of the sample by age and gender.

Of the respondents, 16 per cent were from marketing department, 21 per cent from finance, 27 per cent from HR department, 8 per cent from IT. Production and general management had 5 per cent each, accounts and project management had 3 per cent each and the remaining were from other functions. Of the respondents, 25 per cent earn up to USD 20,000 per year, 46 per cent earn between USD 20,000 and 40,000 per year, 19 per cent earn between USD 40,000 and 60,000 per year and the balance 10 per cent earn above USD 60,000 per year. Table 2 shows the break-up of the sample by age and department and Table 3 by income and department.

Table 1.

Sample Profile

Age	Male	Female	Grand Total
20–30 years	254	159	413
31–40 years	454	183	637
40–50 years	144	26	170
Grand Total	852	368	1,220

Source: Author’s own.

Table 2.

Sample Profile by Age and Department

Age	Department									Grand Total
Age	Mktg	Fin	Acct	HR	IT	Prod	ProjMgt	Gen Mgt	Others	Grand Total
20–30 years	60	92	12	122	41	18	8	15	45	413
31–40 years	111	130	24	176	55	25	24	26	66	637
40–50 years	29	33	6	32	5	15	7	16	27	170
Total	200	255	42	330	101	58	39	57	138	1,220

Source: Author’s own.

Note: Mktg—Marketing, Fin—Finance, Acct—Accounting, HR—Human Resources, IT—Information Technology, Prod—Production, ProjMgt—Project Management, Gen Mgt—General Management.

Results

Table 4 shows the respondents concern for global warming. Of the respondents, 62 per cent seem to be concerned about global warming. While this suggests that the level of awareness is high, it should be noted that there is still a large population who do not seem to be concerned about global warming. Around 15 per cent claim that global warming does not matter to them and 3.5 per cent claim it to be a hoax. Around 13.5 per cent are not sure of the impact of global warming.

Table 3.

Sample Profile by Income and Department

Income in USD	Department									Grand Total
Income in USD	Mktg	Fin	Acct	HR	IT	Prod	ProjMgt	Gen Mgt	Others	Grand Total
<=20,000	53	80	16	60	22	26	10	11	23	301
20,000–40,000	90	127	13	167	54	14	11	24	66	566
40,000–60,000	23	33	12	85	18	13	6	15	25	230
>=60,000	34	15	1	18	7	5	12	7	24	123
Total	200	255	42	330	101	58	39	57	138	1,220

Source: Author’s own.

Note: Mktg—Marketing, Fin—Finance, Acct—Accounting, HR—Human Resources, IT—Information Technology, Prod—Production, ProjMgt—Project Management, Gen Mgt—General Management.

Table 5 shows the views of the respondent’s individual effort and that of the different organizations in addressing the global warming problem. Most respondents feel that they and their organizations are putting sufficient effort, but they feel that the government and international organizations should do more. Around 70 per cent feel that government and international agencies are not doing sufficient to reduce global warming.

Table 4.

Concern for Global Warming

Response	Per cent
A hoax	3.5
Not sure	13.5
Does not matter to me	15
I am concerned	62

Source: Author’s own.

Table 5.

Perceptions about the Effort Put in by Different Organizations to Contain Global Warming

	A Lot Needs To Be Done	Less than Required	Reasonable	More than Required	A Lot Is Being Done
Is your organization doing all it can do	11	20	25	32	12
Are doing everything you can do	12	23	39	21	5
State govt. is doing everything it can do	33.5	42.5	19	4.5	0.5
Central govt. is doing everything it can do	35.5	40.5	18.5	4.5	1
World community is doing everything	27.5	40	24	7	1.5

Source: Author’s own.

Note: Figures given in percentage.

Table 6 shows the efforts the respondents are taking to contain global warming. While a large number of the respondents seem to be careful about energy and water consumption, they do not seem to be doing anything beyond that.

Table 6.

Actions Taken by Individuals towards Reducing Global Warming

	Always Do	Sometimes	Do Not Care
Careful with energy consumption	67	30	3
Careful with water consumption	57	37	6
Use public transportation	15.5	51.5	33
Try to encourage pool cars	10	45	45
Buy carbon credits in airlines	9	27.5	63.5

Source: Author’s own.

Note: Figures given in percentage.

Table 7 shows that the respondents are not keen on acquiring knowledge relating to environment issues and they are not seen as credible source of information for environmental issues.

Table 7.

Knowledge Acquisition by Respondents

	Always Do	Sometimes	Do Not Care
Watch environment programs on TV	7.5	53.5	39
Subscribe for environment magazines	5	30	65
People look to me for environment issues	7.5	0	92.5

Source: Author’s own.

Notes:Figures given in percentage.

Cross tabs across demographic variables showed very little variation in the responses.

Discussion

This article supports Harris (2006) who found that the respondents in Asian countries are aware of the existence of environmental problems but their concerns are not translated into environment-friendly behaviour except for saving electricity and water which are closely related with economic factors than with an environmental consciousness. That is, though green consumers perceive product’s greenness as an important characteristic, other ‘conventional’ product characteristics are somewhat equally demanded or the consumers perceive the green product’s specific environmental characteristics as given (Luzio & Lemke, 2013).

The study also supports the findings of Schlegelmilch, Diamantopoulos and Bohlen (1994), Van Liere and Dunlap (1980) and Straughan and Roberts (1999) that ‘there is very little value in the use of socio-demographic characteristics for profiling consumers for environmental matters.’

Further, the study indicates that the consumers do not obtain information about environment-related issues and they are not perceived to be credible source of information about these matters. As stated by Nisbet and Myers (2007), the slowness of updating of knowledge on environment explains ‘why the issue of global warming has taken so many years to gain traction in the general community’.

Finally, the study suggests that respondents feel that their organizations are doing their bit in containing the problem, but the effort put in by the government and international bodies is insufficient. This could be the reason for the finding (Lai, 2000) that people are hesitant to make ‘individual sacrifices to cooperate with the government’s policy’.

The study, therefore, suggests that the government and other agencies need to increase their effort in educating the urban working class in India about the problems and risks associated with global warming and increase their involvement in addressing the problem.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the blind reviewers for their valuable comments.

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