‘Developed nations must come up with pre-2020 action plans on climate change’

 The Dollar Business Bureau In view of the upcoming Paris Conference 2015on climate change, India urged the developed countries to announce their pre-2020 action plans saying, ‘It will be ironical that we formulate post-2020 architecture without finalizing pre-2020 action plan.’ A statement in this regard was made by Prakash Javadekar, Minister for State (Independent Charge) of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, on Monday. Addressing the Sixth Petersberg Climate Dialogue at Berlin, the Indian Minister said, “The developed countries should present their ambitious targets for pre-2020 action and roadmaps for the same well before Paris.” Ambitious pre-2020 actions of developed countries will create the carbon space for the developing world, as every poor person has the right to equitable access to the atmospheric resources, noted the Minister. Urging the developed countries for pre-action plans, the Minister also informed about plans launched by the Government of India under its future targets aimed at developing projects that are eco-friendly in nature. In this regard, the Minister informed that India launched an ambitious action targeting 175 GW of renewable energy and it has received a tremendous response from investors in the form of Letter of Intents (LOIs) worth more than 200GW of energy. After having increased cess on coal to Rs 200 per tonne, the Indian government is utilizing the funds generated out of it for developing Clean Technologies. He further informed that the Indian government is also under efforts to reduce growing dependence on the fossil fuels and a scheme called ‘Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid & Electric Vehicles in India’ has also been launched in India for this purpose. India, besides incentivizing afforestation by providing the fund assistance of US $ 9 billion or $125 per hectare through the 14th Finance Commission, has also allowed a bill for devolution of more than $6 billion for specific projects of afforestation aimed at creating more carbon sinks, the Minister informed. Apart from ensuring proper architecture for building of 100 clean and green smart cities, the Indian government has also asked 3, 200 severely polluting industries to install 24X7 pollution monitoring devices for effluents as well as emissions, in order to create an eco-friendly environment. Towards leveraging the benefits of solar energy, the Indian government is also making plans for implementing rooftop solar energy program, enabling solar-powered agriculture pumps, using of irrigation canal tops and banks for generating solar energy, among others. India’s action plans are voluntary and have come out of our deep commitment and this should seen against the backdrop that these actions are from a country which is not mandated under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Chang (UNFCC), said the Minister. Therefore, the developed world must take ambitious pre-2020 action, he added.    

May 19, 2015 | 4:55 pm IST.