At the 2025 Global Conference on Climate and Health (Belém, Brazil), delegates from 90 countries came together to shape the Belém Health Action Plan.

About Belem Health Action Plan

• AIM: The plan aims to create a global roadmap that integrates health priorities within the broader climate agenda.
• Cross-Cutting Priorities:
  • Health equity and climate justice.
  • Stronger governance with social participation (women, youth, Indigenous peoples, vulnerable groups).
• Action Lines:
  • Surveillance & Early Warning: Climate-informed health monitoring, real-time data, and strategic stockpiles of medicines and vaccines.
  • Evidence-Based Policy & Capacity Building: Training health workers, integrating climate content into curricula, gender-responsive adaptation, and community resilience.
  • Innovation & Production: Climate-resilient infrastructure, renewable energy in health facilities, sustainable supply chains, and just transitions for vulnerable groups.
• Why does India’s experience matter?
  • These programmes show that non-health interventions can generate substantial health co-benefits while addressing climate challenges. 
  • They provide a practical governance template where welfare, environment, and public health intersect.
  • India’s welfare programmes, though not designed as climate policies, have created remarkable health and climate co-benefits, offering lessons for integrated climate-health governance globally.

Lessons from India in Climate-Health Governance

• Political Leadership Ensures Policy Convergence: High-level involvement drives coordination across ministries and accelerates implementation.
  • Example: Direct Prime Ministerial push for Swachh Bharat and PMUY brought multiple departments together and delivered nationwide results.
• Community Engagement Builds Ownership: Cultural values and grassroots participation make policies more relatable and sustainable.
  • Example: Swachh Bharat invoked Gandhi’s vision of cleanliness, while PM Poshan relied on Parent-Teacher Associations for community support.
• Leveraging Existing Institutions Enhances Delivery: Using established networks avoids duplication and ensures last-mile reach.
  • Example: ASHA workers, Panchayats, and Self-Help Groups became effective channels for implementing welfare programmes.
• Scalable Models for the Global South: India’s welfare-based interventions demonstrate how low-cost policies can achieve health, climate, and development goals together.
  • Example: Schemes like PM Poshan (Nutrition + Climate-resilient crops) and PMUY (Clean energy + Health gains) show pathways that other developing nations can adopt to align with SDG-3 (Health), SDG-7 (Clean Energy), and SDG-13 (Climate Action).

India’s Welfare Programmes and their Climate–Health Co-Benefits

Though none of these schemes began as climate initiatives, they have generated significant environmental gains alongside health improvements.

• Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY): By replacing biomass with LPG for cooking, the scheme reduced household air pollution and respiratory ailments while simultaneously cutting carbon emissions. 
• PM Poshan (Mid-Day Meal Scheme): The programme tackles malnutrition, integrates millets into school meals which supports child health and builds climate-resilient food systems (aligned with 2023 UN International Year of Millets).
• Swachh Bharat Abhiyan: The nationwide sanitation mission improved hygiene, reduced diarrhoeal disease, and enhanced dignity, while also advancing environmental goals through cleaner water sources and safer waste management.
• Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA): By ensuring wage employment, the scheme enhanced rural livelihoods and simultaneously funded ecological works such as afforestation, watershed management, and soil conservation, strengthening community climate resilience.

Challenges of Integrating Health and Climate through Welfare Policies

• Administrative Silos: Ministries and departments work independently, which restricts intersectoral cooperation between health, energy, agriculture, and environment. 
  • Example: India’s Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) process does not mandate Health Impact Assessments (HIAs), meaning health outcomes of climate policies and projects are rarely evaluated systematically.
• Economic Barriers: Affordability issues and competing business interests reduce the long-term impact of welfare-linked climate policies.
  • Example: High LPG refill costs under PMUY discourage sustained usage, as oil marketing priorities often outweigh beneficiary needs.
• Social and Cultural Resistance: Deep-rooted practices, gender norms, and behavioural inertia hinder adoption of cleaner and healthier alternatives.
  • Example: Despite LPG distribution, many households continue to use biomass due to cooking preferences and cultural habits.
• Equity Concerns: Marginalised groups struggle with access and benefit delivery, reinforcing inequalities in health and climate resilience.
  • Example: Tribal and remote communities often face gaps in sanitation coverage, nutrition schemes, and clean energy access.
  • Fifth round of the National Family and Health Survey (NFHS-5) report showed that 30% of households still have not used an improved sanitation facility, and it is considerably higher in rural areas (35%)

Way Forward for India’s Climate-Health Governance

• Strategic Prioritisation by Political Leaders: Framing climate action as an immediate health and welfare issue generates stronger political will and public acceptance.
  • Example: PMUY gained traction by being projected as women’s empowerment and a health intervention, not just an energy reform.
• Procedural Integration Across Ministries: Embedding health considerations into all climate-relevant policies ensures intersectoral convergence.
  • Example: Just as Environmental Impact Assessments are mandated for major projects, Health Impact Assessments can be made compulsory for policies in energy, transport, and urban planning.
• Participatory Implementation at the Community Level: Mobilising communities through local institutions builds ownership and sustainability of climate-health policies.
  • Example: Involving ASHA workers and Panchayats in awareness campaigns can make connections between climate action and everyday health outcomes more relatable.
• Outcome-Based Monitoring Mechanisms: Measuring results in terms of health improvements rather than only outputs ensures accountability and effectiveness.
  • Example: Instead of counting LPG cylinders distributed, monitoring should track actual reduction in respiratory illnesses and adoption rates of clean fuel.
• International Leadership and Knowledge Sharing: India can showcase its welfare-linked climate-health successes to influence global frameworks.
  • Example: Lessons from Poshan, Swachh Bharat, and MNREGA can be shared through platforms like COP30 to guide the Belém Health Action Plan for the Global South.
• Scaling Heat Action Plans: India can replicate the Ahmedabad Heat Action Plan (2013) which is  South Asia’s first climate-health early warning system –across vulnerable regions.
  • Such plans integrate early warning, medical preparedness, and community awareness, reducing mortality and productivity losses from heatwaves.

Conclusion

India’s experience shows that welfare-led, intersectoral governance creates win-win solutions for climate and health. By embedding health in climate policies, leveraging existing institutions, and ensuring equity, India can evolve a model of health-anchored climate governance that balances development, environment, and well-being.

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