New Delhi: India on Tuesday said the IPCC report vindicated and scientifically established the country’s position on the historical responsibility of developed countries for consuming the carbon budget and justifies it’s emphasis on equity at all scales in climate action and sustainable development.
“The report underlines the need for deep and urgent global emissions reduction. Four-fifths of the total carbon budget for 1.5 degree Celsius temperature increase and two-thirds of the total carbon budget for 2 degrees Celsius warming has been already consumed. Fifty per cent of the global population, vast majority in the developing world, is responsible for only 14 per cent of the global emissions,” Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav said commenting on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report of the Working Group III (AR6 WGIII) on ‘Mitigation of Climate Change.’
It mentions that ‘equity’ remains a central element in the UN climate regime, notwithstanding shifts in differentiation between states over time and challenges in assessing fair shares. The finding is based on the report’s assessment that with a shrinking remaining carbon budget, the access to a fair share of this budget for developing countries has become an important question, he said commenting on the IPCC report.
The report focuses on mitigation – what one can do to reduce emissions to keep the world on a Paris aligned temperature pathway – and mentions the carbon free and low carbon technologies available as well as the potential of digitalisation through robotics, artificial intelligence for supporting energy efficiency and renewable energy.
Reminding that the report fully supports India’s view on the necessity of public finance for developing countries and that it notes specifically that ‘Tracked financial flows fall short of the levels needed to achieve mitigation goals across all sectors and regions’, the Minister said: “The challenge of closing gaps is largest in developing countries as a whole. Public finance falls short of the Copenhagen goal of USD 100 billion per year by 2020.”
Yadav said the report also endorses India’s position on the need for scale, scope and speed in climate finance.
Asserting that the report embodies that changes in lifestyle and behaviours have a significant role to play in mitigating climate change, Yadav said: “The report endorses India’s view on the need for curbing unsustainable consumption. The report notes that both cumulative and per capita annual emissions rose during the pre-2020 period. Pre-2020 emissions reduction in developed countries has been insufficient in comparison to the developing world’s needs for sustainable development. Both historical cumulative emissions and per capita annual emissions show that India’s role (as part of South Asia) is minimal.”
Yadav also narrated the multitude of actions taken by India to address the threat of global climate change and how India demonstrates to be the voice of ambition as well as the champion of equity on behalf of developing countries by specific, targeted actions, in specific suggestions and proposals and a firm faith in both science and human values.
–IANS