The Minister for Environment and Forests, Ms Jayanthi Natarajan, made it clear on Friday that India would put pressure on richer nations to shoulder a larger burden of the climate change responsibility at the Rio meet in June.
She said the principle of “equity” for cutting greenhouse gas emissions should be the “bottomline” of negotiations on climate change. She was addressing a session in the ongoing Delhi Sustainable Development Summit.
World leaders are meeting in Rio de Janeiro in June for the United Nations Conference on sustainable development, known as Rio+20.
India and China have differences with the developed countries that are seeking to make the commitments at the conference binding and enforceable.
Meanwhile, the European Union climate head, reacting to India's position on equity and the right of countries to develop, said the EU realised that those who industrialised before others had a special responsibility, but India and others also needed to come up with what exactly they mean when they talk about equity. At a media interaction here on Friday, the EU Climate Commissioner, Ms Connie Hedegaard, said, “We are open to discussions,”, but added that “in a world where we are mutually inter-dependent, we need to be mutually accountable as well.”
RENEWABLE ENERGY
The EU climate head called upon all countries to pledge to double the share of renewable energy by 2030 along with ensuring universal access to energy. Ms Hedegaard said the EU may recommend the phasing out of fossil fuel subsidies before 2020 at the Rio+20 meet. “The notion that fossil fuels are cheaper is changing. With crude oil prices going up, the world will need to reflect on alternatives,” she said.
She said in 2010, the world subsidised fossil fuels worth $400 billion. Of this, only 10 per cent were targeted at the poor, according to International Energy Agency data.
No comments:
Post a Comment