Climate-affected countries need tech, financial support
UN Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh Gwyn Lewis yesterday said loss and damages and adaptation need to be on the table at COP27 and urgent steps need to be taken to provide financial and technological support to countries like Bangladesh, which have been the most impacted by climate change.
Speaking at "DCAB Talk", held at Jatiya Press Club in Dhaka, Lewis said climate change is also impacting Bangladesh's economy.
The UNRC said COP27 comes at a time when South Asia is "impacted in unprecedented ways" by climate change, whether it is the floods in Sylhet and Sunamganj, Bangladesh or in Pakistan and repeated cyclones in India and Bangladesh in recent years.
"Unfortunately, climate talks have been bogged down with politics and economic pressures, so we need to see more citizen action and listen to the voices of people living in Bangladesh, particularly young people and women who are often excluded," she said.
"UN plans to further work on supporting the government to implement the national adaptation plan and the other policy frameworks such as the Delta Plan and the Mujib Climate Prosperity action plan," she said.
By one estimate, up to 50 percent of those now living in Bangladesh's urban slums may be there because they were forced to flee their rural homes as a result of riverbank erosion or flooding, said Lewis.
The data shows that from 2000 to 2019, Bangladesh suffered economic losses worth over $3.72 billion due to extreme weather events linked to climate change. This leads to another area of work that the UN is supporting -- economic growth and LDC graduation, she said.
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