Leaders’ Summit on Climate: Focus on temperature, funding, technology

Keeping global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius, climate funding, technology transfer, and rehabilitating the climate migrants should be the major issues that Bangladesh needs to focus on at the Leaders' Summit on Climate, said leading climate experts and policymakers yesterday.

The summit is scheduled to be held from April 22 to April 23.

At the same time, Bangladesh also needs to focus on the damages that are being incurred by the frequent and intense events of climate change -- flood, cyclones, salinity intrusion, they said.

These events are affecting the health and livelihoods of millions of people, mostly in the coastal and char areas, they added.

Experts say the Leaders' Summit on Climate is going to be virtually hosted by US President Joe Biden and joined by 40 countries including Bangladesh ahead of the COP26 in November.

The observations came at a webinar jointly organised by COAST Foundation, Campaign for Sustainable Rural Livelihood (CSRL), Coastal Livelihood and Environmental Action Network, Bangladesh Indigenous People Network on Climate Change & Biodiversity (BIPNet-CCBD), and Centre for Participatory Research and Development (CPRD).

Saber Hossain Chowdhury, chair of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Ministry of Forest, Environment and Climate Change, said Biden has returned to Paris Agreement and is now seeking to take a leadership position on climate.

Biden's new plan to spend USD 2 trillion in four years, to significantly escalate the use of clean energy, is a testimony to it.

"The US will do a lot of research and development on renewable energy technology. We should focus on how Bangladesh can benefit from the new technologies," he said.

He said the Paris Agreement, signed in 2015, speaks of keeping the global temperature rise within 2 degrees Celsius, but "we should demand that to keep it within 1.5 degrees Celsius. It should be an imperative."

Saber said Bangladesh should strongly demand mobilising USD 100 billion for the Green Climate Fund annually from 2020.

Barrister Shamim Haider Patwary, a lawmaker from Gaibandha, said climate events like floods are causing huge displacement in his constituency.

Parts of North Bengal saw floods four times last year and river erosion in three phases, causing displacement of thousands of people and damaging infrastructures, he added.

Citing studies, he said 25 percent of people in Bangladesh could be displaced due to extreme climate events by 2040 if global temperature rise can't be kept below 1.5 degrees Celsius.

"We need funding to protect the people from climate events. We also should demand punishment for the major carbon emitters who don't meet the climate targets," the MP said.

Dr Qazi Kholiquzzaman Ahmad, chairman of Palli Karma Sahayak Foundation, said it is important to highlight what Bangladesh has already done for mitigation and adaptation from its own fund.

At the same time, he said, Bangladesh, as a climate-vulnerable country, should get money from the Green Climate Fund as grants, not a loan.

Atiq Rahaman, executive director of Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies, criticised the US for forgetting its role in reducing carbon emission in the last four years and demanded that the country compensates for the damages caused by the extreme climate events globally.

BRAC University Prof Emeritus Dr Ainun Nishat said Bangladesh may not benefit from the market mechanism under the Paris Agreement. Therefore, the focus should be on finance and climate migration as the US is recognising the issue of climate migration.

Ziaul Hoque Mukta of CSRL; Dr Manjurul Hannan Khan, former additional secretary at the ministry of environment; Sharif Jamil, general secretary of Bangladesh Paribesh Andolon; Shamsuddoha, chief executive of CPRD; Mrinal Kanti Tripura of BIPNet-CCBD; Hasan Mehedi of CLEAN-BD; and Kawser Rahman of Bangladesh Climate Journalists Forum; also spoke at the webinar moderated by Rezaul Karim Chowdhury of COAST Foundation.