Union Minister for Environment, Forests and Climate Change Prakash Javadekar on Saturday said India, along with 100 other nations, would ratify the COP 21 Global Climate Agreement on April 22 at a high level signing ceremony to be convened at the UN Headquarters in New York.
The agreement, negotiated at the Paris summit in December 2015, sets out a global action plan to put the world on track by limiting global warming below 2 degree Celsius.
Speaking at a symposium titled ‘COP 21 – Building Synergies, Shaping Actions’ organided by Mumbai University, Mr Javadekar described the Paris agreement as a victory of multilateralism and the one which helped correct image perception of India.
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“India was always perceived to be a naysayer and negative in its approach and took a corner seat in most of the international conferences. But in Paris, Prime Minister Narendra Modi introduced the concept of climate justice, driving home the message of sustainable development,” he said.
Mr Javadekar said climate change was a reality with one degree rise in temperature caused by 150 years of uncontrolled carbon emission by the developed world. He said India accounted for only 3 per cent carbon emission, while cumulative US contribution was 30 per cent. He said Europe Canada, and other developed world contributed 50 per cent.