COP27: Onus on US, Europe to board climate response -

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By S Jha

New Delhi, November 5: Former US President Donald Trump had yielded to the corporate lobby in his country to wreck the Paris Accord to limit the global carbon emission to two per cent. The UN Report on Climate Change has confirmed that the world convincingly missed all targets to mitigate the crisis, which made visible impacts this year.

Pakistan, which claims not to contribute even one per cent of the carbon emission, had one-third of the country submerged in super floods, which killed over a thousand people. Before the super floods caused the fury, Pakistan faced an unprecedented heat wave, which has resulted in the Islamic country losing about 20 per cent of the wheat, staple food of its people, output.

A large part of China battled heatwave, with some of its rivers drying up, this year, while the people faced with harshest of the restrictions in the name of ‘Zero Covid Policy’ have shared a number of videos, alleging lack of foodgrains, including rice, the staple food of the country. Since China is an information drought country, the true state of the food crisis is not yet known.

People in the UK were shocked this year to see the asphalt melting on the roads, as the European countries faced unprecedented heat wave this year. The climate change impact was equally visible in the Latin American countries, besides the US too.

In this backdrop, the COP27 at Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt is beginning from Sunday and conclude on November 18, with the urgency to accelerate the measures to adopt green energy and cut down on carbon emissions at the top of the agenda of the global leaders. US President Joe Biden a few months ago had addressed the Ministers of Environment of several countries in which had vowed to work for the adoption of the technologies to replace the dependence on the fossil fuels in countries like India and Europe.

The Indian Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav has also arrived in Sharm el-Sheikh to take part in the deliberations, which will be keenly monitored by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has shown to take the global leadership in the adoption and promotion of clean energy, especially solar power. “At the meet, India will discuss the mantra of LiFE, Lifestyle for Environment coined by PM Modi. Mission LiFE will remind the global community that COP27 must focus on the forgotten SDG (sustainable Development Goal) 12 that calls for ensuring sustainable consumption and production matters,” Yadav said on his arrival at the venue.

However, Yadav arrived at the crucial meeting when India’s national capital has been subsumed by toxic pollution, with farmers in Punjab and Haryana setting fire to the agricultural fields in their bids to clear the land for the sowing of the next crop, as part of the tradition practiced for several years and to which the governments close their eyes.

Ahead of the COP27 deliberations, a key Committee dealing with climate finance has published four new reports that will form an important basis for discussions by governments, which seeks to provide a comprehensive landscape of climate finance from the perspective of current climate finance flows, progress towards achieving the goal of mobilizing jointly $100 billion per year, definitions on climate finance, and efforts aimed at making finance flows consistent with a pathway towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient development. The reports noted that key targets to mobilize climate finance for developing countries have not been met.

Ironically, the Paris Accord had sought cut down on coal consumption, but the post-pandemic era has seen record demand for the fossil fuel, leading to its price spike globally. Countries such as India will impress upon the developed world for technology transfer and not profiteer from the green energy knowledge sharing.