World leaders at the G7 Summit hosted by the UK in Cornwall, south-west England, are set to conclude on Sunday by setting out tough climate action targets and a clampdown on the use of coal and fossil fuels. The leaders of the UK, the US, Canada, France, Germany Italy, Japan, alongside India, Australia, South Africa and South Korea as guest nations, are meeting for the third and final day of the Summit in Carbis Bay, Cornwall, on Sunday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be addressing the summit on the Building Back Better and Greener strands virtually from New Delhi. According to a UK government statement, the leaders will lay out the action they plan to take to slash carbon emissions, including measures like “ending all unabated coal as soon as possible, ending almost all direct government support for the fossil fuel energy sector overseas and phasing out petrol and diesel cars".
They are expected to agree plans to transform the financing of infrastructure projects in developing countries as part of a raft of measures at the summit to address the climate crisis and protect nature. In addition to taking action at home, G7 leaders will commit to increase their contributions to international climate finance to meet the target of mobilising USD 100 billion a year, which will help developing countries deal with the impacts of climate change and support sustainable, green growth.
“Protecting our planet is the most important thing we as leaders can do for our people. There is a direct relationship between reducing emissions, restoring nature, creating jobs and ensuring long-term economic growth," said British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. “As democratic nations we have a responsibility to help developing countries reap the benefits of clean growth through a fair and transparent system. The G7 has an unprecedented opportunity to drive a global Green Industrial Revolution, with the potential to transform the way we live, he said.
The G7 will also commit to almost halve their emissions by 2030 relative to 2010. The UK said it is already going further, pledging to cut emissions by at least 68 per cent by 2030 on 1990 levels 58 per cent reduction on 2010 levels. As part of Britain’s commitments, Johnson launched the UK’s Blue Planet Fund from the G7 Summit’s ocean-side setting in Cornwall. The 500 million pounds fund will support countries including Ghana, Indonesia and Pacific island states to tackle unsustainable fishing, protect and restore coastal ecosystems like mangroves and coral reefs, and reduce marine pollution.
The G7 is also expected to endorse a Nature Compact to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030 including supporting the global target to conserve or protect at least 30 per cent of land and 30 per cent of ocean globally by the end of the decade. Sir David Attenborough, renowned British environmentalist and the UK’s COP26 People’s Champion, will address the leaders of the G7 countries plus guests at a session on Climate and Nature and urge all of the world’s leading economies to take action to secure the future of the planet.
“The natural world today is greatly diminished. That is undeniable. Our climate is warming fast. That is beyond doubt. Our societies and nations are unequal and that sadly is plain to see, said Attenborough. But the question science forces us to address specifically in 2021 is whether as a result of these intertwined facts we are on the verge of destabilising the entire planet? If that is so, then the decisions we make this decade in particular the decisions made by the most economically advanced nations are the most important in human history, he said.
The G7 Leaders’ Summit has been dubbed the first-ever net-zero G7, with all countries having committed to reach net zero emissions by 2050 at the latest with ambitious reductions targets in the 2020s. The UK, as the host nation, has pitched it as a “stepping-stone" on the road to COP26, which also the UK will host in Glasgow in November.
Read all the Latest News, Breaking News and Coronavirus News here.
(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed - PTI)
