Limit rise of climate change while making available sufficient

Noting that the threat of climate change is "real" and India is vulnerable to it, President Pranab Mukherjee today stressed the need for adopting a twin approach of limiting rise of climate change and at the same time ensuring existence of sufficient resources to meet the country's future development needs.
Observing that India ratified the "landmark" Paris deal recently, he hoped the country's move will encourage other nations to follow and ratify the agreement so that it can come into force, giving a "major" boost to the fight against climate change.
"India ratified the landmark Paris Agreement that was reached at the 21st Conference of Parties. As President of the republic, four days ago I had the privilege to ratify the agreement. I am glad that our ratification has occurred prior to the next COP22 (in Morocco) and I hope that it will encourage other countries to follow suit.

"If the legally required ratification by countries who together account for 55 per cent of the global emissions is achieved, it will enable the coming into force of the Paris Agreement before the next conference. This will be a major boost to our fight against climate change," Mukherjee said.
He was speaking after inaugurating the World Sustainable Development Summit (WSDS), 2016, organised by The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) on the theme 'Beyond 2015: People, Planet and Progress'.
Noting that promising initiatives have been taken both at the national and international levels aimed at addressing the challenge of climate change, Mukherjee said the adoption of the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals in 2015 are two "crucial" steps in this effort as they underline that all nations need to work together for a common future.

Noting that the climate action plans submitted by India before the Paris agreement are "ambitious", Mukherjee said it will be possible to achieve the targets if steps are accelerated on several fronts.

"We need to follow a twin-tracked approach of limiting the rise of climate change while ensuring the existence of sufficient resources to meet our future developmental requirements. We should aim at creating a society that is prosperous but not wasteful.
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"As a developing country with shared concerns on climate vulnerability, India has a vital stake in an equitable and multi-lateral approach towards climate change," the President said.

He said the threat of climate change is "real and immediate" and developing economies like India are more vulnerable to climate change as they are closely tied to climate-sensitive sectors like agriculture and forestry.
Mukherjee said that although the climate action plans are complemented by the National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPCC) which sets out a comprehensive response to the challenges of climate change, it is the effective implementation of these missions which is most "critical".
"Merely setting up of policies and missions, to my mind, is not adequate. It is the effective implementation and enforcement of these policies that is most critical," he said.

Referring to India's achievements in both renewable energy and energy efficiency, the President said that while the country's progress in this direction is globally significant, there is a need to continue pursuing more ambitious goals.
He noted that though India is home to almost 18 per cent of the world's population, it possess only four per cent of the world's renewable water resources while its energy consumption constitutes six per cent of the global energy consumption.
He said that still India is energy deficient as 250 million people of India have no access to any sort of electricity.
"Resource constraints notwithstanding, we have worked hard to become the fastest growing economy amongst the major economies of the world. We have the capacity to clock sustained high growth. But growth is dependent on resource availability, especially energy.

"Factors such as demography, development and urbanisation exert tremendous pressure on availability of resources. Large-scale utilisation of resources leads to their depletion and also impacts adversely on the environment. This results in reduced availability of resources for future growth putting a question mark on the sustainable development of an economy," he said.
Noting that the world is facing challenges in all the three dimensions of sustainable development: economic, social and environmental, Mukherjee said while on one hand, over a billion-and-a-quarter people are still living in poverty, on the other, patterns of unsustainable production and consumption are endangering the planet's eco-systems.

"This threat presents us with an opportunity to work together. Global action built on partnerships is required to achieve sustainable economic and social progress, inclusive growth and protection of the earth's eco-systems.
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Chief Minister of Sikkim, Pawan Kumar Chamling, was felicitated with the Sustainable Development Leadership Award for his contributions towards making the state the first fully organic state in the country.
His government's successful implementation of the Sikkim Organic Mission Project helped make organic seeds and manures widely available and facilitated farmers market their agricultural produce, and provided the farmers with advanced training in organic farming.
"This award is a validation of our efforts towards protection and conversation of nature. It is a recognition of our vision of sustainable development, which we have pursued with our programmes and policies for the last 22 years," he said.