It's heartening to review the summary of governmental and private climate and energy commitments compiled by United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon at the end of his daylong climate change summit. They range from a substantial new push to reduce and eventually eliminate forest loss to boosted investment in a planned clean-energy corridor in Africa.
The difference between this summit and the meeting the secretary general convened in 2009 is enormous. The goal five years ago was to build momentum to "seal the deal" on a binding climate treaty — a fruitless task given the divisions among the world's nations — while this conclave was centered on a more modest, but more concrete, achievement — "to raise political momentum for a meaningful universal climate agreement [notice there's no mention of the word "binding"] in Paris in 2015 and to galvanize transformative action in all countries to reduce emissions and build resilience to the adverse impacts of climate change."
Here are some significant bullet points from the summary once you get beyond the boilerplate:
Paths to cuts in emissions:
- The New York Declaration on Forests, launched and supported by more than 150 partners, including 28 government, 8 subnational governments, 35 companies, 16 indigenous peoples groups, and 45 NGO and civil society groups, aims to halve the loss of natural forests globally by 2030.
- Twenty-four leading global producers of palm oil as well as commodities traders committed to contribute to the goal of zero net deforestation by 2020 and to work with Governments, private sector partners and indigenous peoples to ensure a sustainable supply chain.
- Some of the world's largest retailers of meat and agricultural products committed to adapt their supply chains to reduce emissions and build resilience to climate change. They will assist 500 million farmers in the process.
Financial moves:
- A coalition of institutional investors, committed to decarbonizing $100 billion by December 2015 and to measure and disclose the carbon footprint of at least $500 billion in investments.
- The insurance industry committed to double its green investments to $84 billion by the end of 2015.
Energy and agriculture:
- Leaders from 19 countries and 32 partners from Government, regional organisations, development institutions and private investors committed to creating an 8,000 kilometre-long African Clean Energy Corridor.
- The Global Alliance for Climate-Smart Agriculture, comprised of 16 countries and 37 organisations, was launched to enable 500 million farmers worldwide to practice climate-smart agriculture by 2030.
- Leaders of the oil and gas industry, along with national Governments and civil society organisations, made an historic commitment to identify and reduce methane emissions by 2020.
- A second industry-led initiative was launched by leading producers of petroleum who committed to address methane as well as other key climate challenges, followed by regular reporting on ongoing efforts. Industry leaders and Governments also committed to reduce HFCs in refrigeration and food storage.
These are modest moves. Many were already in the works. But this is a long climate and energy march and it's great to see the United Nations helping highlight and sustain such initiatives.
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