Conservation & Environment: Implications in Theory, Practice and Policy

Abstract

Both conservation and environment together with exploration are the basic elements in sustainable development. The three need to be given their due space in public policy analysis. Otherwise, policy making will merely be target-fixing and slogandriven. The objective of this paper is to examine and analyse the issues of both conservation and environment together in the development and exploitation of mineral resources in a historical perspective. deals both with the theory and practice of conservation which is, in fact, a part of environmental management. At present, there is a general consensus that sustainable development implies an active role for government in efficient and equitable management of natural and environmental resources.In this context, AC Pigou wrote in 1932 that: It is the clear duty of Government, which is the trustee for unborn generations as well as for its present citizens, to watch over, and if need be, by legislative enactment, to defend the exhaustible resources of this country from rash and reskless spoliation. The present paper observes that the real costs of coal in future will be much higher due to the inclusion of social costs and conservation practices. The policy of cross-subsidization at the corporate level is identified as the best possible solution to the problem of achieving conservation in mineral resources development and exploitation. Perhaps, the very nature of resource-base requires this policy for rational resources management.