Bhupender Yadav calls for science for urgent global climate action at G20

INTERNATIONAL DESK: Indian Minister for Environment, Forests and Climate Change, Bhupender Yadav, on Saturday said that the G20 must respond to the call of science for urgent global climate action in this decade, on the second and concluding day of the G20 summit, The Indian Express reports.

The G20 Energy and Climate Joint Ministerial Meeting held today at, Naples, Italy was attended virtually by the Indian delegation.

Speaking at different sessions on Climate Change, the Environment Minister underlined the need to cut absolute emissions rapidly while taking into account the Paris Agreement which emphasised on respective historical responsibilities, delivery of promised climate finance and technologies at low cost keeping in perspective per capita emissions, differences in per capita GDP and the unfinished agenda for sustainable development.

“While the promised support, on the basis of which developing countries have taken ambitious targets and have ratified the Paris Agreement, was not delivered, we find that new benchmarks for global climate ambition and Climate leadership are being proposed. We should not be shifting goalposts and setting new benchmarks for global climate ambition,” said the Minister today, adding that common but differentiated responsibilities to combat climate change, as per respective capabilities and national circumstances, lies at the heart of the UNFCCC & its Paris Agreement.

In a session on ‘Paris Aligned Financial Flow’ at the ongoing G20 summit, India said that the momentum of climate change can only be accelerated when there is enough support through means of implementation including finance and technology.

Yadav said that India remains steadfast in its commitments to join and lead efforts to combat climate change within the multilateral agreed convention and its Paris Agreement.

The Minister mentioned about the vision of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi , installing 450 GW (Giga Watt) of RE (Renewable Energy) by 2030, enhanced ambition in bio-fuels, India’s NDCs (Nationally Determined Contributions) and various other initiatives taken by India on Urban Climate Action.

“With increase in urbanization, it is important to create and preserve green spaces and protect biodiversity in urban areas” said Yadav, informing that India’s Urban Climate Actions include Climate Smart Cities Assessment Framework, National Mission on Sustainable Habitat, Climate Center for Cities, Climate Smart Cities Alliance, Climate Practitioners India Network, Urban Forestry, etc.

India also welcomed the G20 works on Sustainable Recovery, Cities, Financial Flows, etc.

In its final communique, the G20 issued a statement saying that, “Conscious of the role G20 members have in responding to these challenges and mindful that 2021 is a critical year for catalyzing and scaling up transformative action, we restate our commitment to the objectives of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its sustainable development goals (SDGs) and targets. We stress that biodiversity conservation, protection, sustainable use and restoration are critical to achieve the SDGs and to halt and reverse biodiversity loss. We recognize that some of the potential underlying causes of some emerging infectious diseases and zoonoses in humans are the same as those that drive biodiversity loss, land degradation and climate change and that pandemic risk can be lowered by targeting such drivers.’’

The summit has also stressed increased attention must be paid to illegal logging and illegal wildlife trade, illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing and illegal traffic of waste, combating illicit financial flows deriving from crimes that affect the environment, health of oceans and seas, concentrating on dealing with marine litter and in particular marine plastic litter and a focus on resource efficiency and circular economy.

The G20 also highlighted the “urgent need to align financial flows to sustainable development”, as well as for additional financial flows from a wide variety of sources if biodiversity, ocean, land degradation and climate targets were to be met and ecosystem services were to be enhanced.