Context: Recently, India secured 168 rank in the 12th edition of the biennial Environment Performance Index (EPI Index 2020) that measured the environmental performance of 180 countries and was released by the Yale University on June 4, 2020. India’s rank was 177 (with a score of 30.57 out of 100) in 2018.
About Environment Performance Index(EPI)

• The EPI measures the environmental performance of 180 countries.
• It is biennially released by Yale University.
• It considers 32 indicators of environmental performance, giving a snapshot of the 10-year trends in environmental performance at the national and global levels.

Indicators used to the Index:

• Adjusted emission growth rates;
• Composed of growth rates of four greenhouse gases and one pollutant;
• Growth rate in carbon dioxide emissions from land cover;
• Greenhouse gas intensity growth rate; and
• Greenhouse gas emissions per capita.

India’s performance:

• India’s rank was 177 (with a score of 27.6 out of 100) in 2018
• A ten-year comparison progress report in the index showed that India slipped on climate-related parameters.
• India scored below the regional average score on all five key parameters on environmental health, including air quality, sanitation and drinking water, heavy metals and waste management.
• It has also scored below the regional average on parameters related to biodiversity and ecosystem services too.
• Among South Asian countries, India was at the second position (rank 106) after Pakistan on ‘climate change’. Pakistan’s score (50.6) was the highest under the category.

Suggestions for India:

• India needs to re-double national sustainability efforts on all fronts.
• The country needs to focus on a wide spectrum of sustainability issues, with a high-priority to critical issues such as air and water quality, biodiversity and climate change.

Global performance:

• Denmark came in first place, followed by Luxembourg and Switzerland. The United Kingdom ranked fourth.
• The US is far behind other industrialized nations on environmental performance and now ranks 24th in the world.

Important facts:

• Countries lagging behind India: The 11 countries were Burundi, Haiti, Chad, Soloman Islands, Madagascar, Guinea, Côte d’Ivoir, Sierra Leone, Afghanistan, Myanmar and Liberia.
• All South Asian countries, except Afghanistan, were ahead of India in the ranking.