Why in news?
The 2019 UN Climate Action Summit was held at the headquarters of the UN in New York City in September 2019 with the theme, “Climate Action Summit 2019: A Race We Can Win. A Race We Must Win.”
Commitments done:
- Sixty-five countries and the European Union pledged to cut Greenhouse gas emission to zero by the year 2050, thus the number of countries making this pledge reached 77.
- The Small Island Developing States collectively increased their climate targets by 2020, achieve 100% of energy from renewable sources by 2030 and achieve a zero-carbon economy by 2050, provided they are helped by the international community.
- France pledged to not enter into trade deals with countries that have policies contrary to the Paris Agreement.
- Greece and Hungary pledged to close their coal-fired power plants by 2028 and 2030, respectively.
- The Global Campaign for Nature led by Guatemala and Costa Rica started to function. The target of the campaign is to protect 30% of the earth surface by the year 2030.
- The Climate Ambition Alliance, presided by President of Chile, Sebastian Pinera was created.
- The alliance aims to unite the countries that want to increase their commitments by the year 2020. Fifty-nine countries said that they will do so.
- The organization “High Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy” was created.
- It includes 14 countries, covering a large part of the world coasts and fisheries and seeks to protect the oceans and create marine protected areas.
- The European Union promised to give a quarter of its budget to climate action in 2020.
- India promised to bring their renewable energy capacity to 175 gig watts by the 2022 and to 450 gig watts after.
- Eighty countries joined the India and France led the International Solar Alliance.
- The Russian Federation pledged to ratify the Paris Agreement, increasing the number of signatories to 187.
- Russia being the fourth largest emitter of greenhouse gases (GHG), the targets for Russia in the agreement are reducing the emissions by 30% from the level of 1990 by the year 2030.
- Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI), an international partnership that will support countries – developed and developing, to build climate and disaster resilient infrastructure was mooted.
- The Coalition’s secretariat, based in Delhi, will facilitate knowledge exchange, provide technical support and support capacity building.
- The Government of India, the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) and partners have together worked on the CDRI initiative
