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Vulnerable economies call on rich nations to avert global climate-Covid economic threat
Sun Online Desk
Vulnerable economies on Thursday called upon the rich nations to avert global climate-Covid economic threat.
The 48 most vulnerable economies demand “2020-2024 delivery plan” for the missing $100 billion annual Paris Agreement climate assistance.
Led by Bangladesh as chair of the V20, the world’s most climate vulnerable economies met virtually as heads of state and government, ministers of finance and economy, together with leaders of the United Nations, partner economies and the global financial system to address the compound, destabilizing effect of climate disasters and the Covid-19 pandemic on low- and middle-income economies.
Last week, I wrote in this daily about the need for Bangladesh to take a whole of society approach to international diplomacy on tackling climate change globally, rather than depending on the annual Conference of Parties (COP) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) which meets only once a year for two weeks.
Climate change is now a global emergency which requires actions every single day, from all sectors of society, if we are to have any hope of averting its worst impacts. This is equally true at the national level, not just for Bangladesh, but for every country, especially the most vulnerable developing countries.
One can argue that the issue of tackling climate change in Bangladesh has already achieved a whole-of-government approach, and is also rapidly moving towards a whole-of-society approach. However, our international diplomacy on tackling climate change also needs to develop both approaches.
What do these two terms mean, and how are they being rolled out? The whole-of-government approach means that not only ministries and departments, but also other branches such as local government, parliament, and even security and military apparatus, along with the judiciary, need to be involved. The whole-of-society approach means the additional inclusion of the private sector, media, academia, civil society and professional groups such as lawyers, doctors, planners and others.
Bangladesh is planning to adapt to the adverse impacts of human-induced climate change and aiming to become a resilient country by 2030, as both the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Agreement on Climate Change goals are supposed to be achieved by that year.
At the same time, we are looking forward to graduating out of the Least Developed Countries (LDC) status in the next few years and need to also plan this transition carefully. One important dimension of transitioning from being an LDC to becoming a developing country is for knowledge generation and capacity-building to be carried out by our own citizens, rather than depending on international consultants to provide us with technical assistance.