India committed to fight against climate change

Lima, Dec 11 (PTI) India today expressed confidence that negotiators at the UN Climate Change Summit here could put in place the stepping stones towards a post­2020 deal under a comprehensive, balanced, equitable and pragmatic Convention that will address the genuine needs of developing nations. Speaking at the High Level Segment of UNFCCC COP-20 at Lima, Minister for Environment, Forests and Climate Change Prakash Javadekar said India is committed and ready to play its part in the global fight against climate change. "We are pursuing action-oriented policies to bring rapid development to our people while purposefully addressing climate change...We have shown that we have the vision and the political will to act," he said. "Our ambition in the post-2020 period is directly linked with ambitious actions in the pre-2020 period by the developed countries, otherwise the poor people in developing countries will not get the carbon space to achieve sustainable development," he said. Noting that the number of poor people in the world is more than twice the combined population of Europe and all of them are in developing countries, he said, "We are determined to ensure development to all these people and provide them with basic services of energy, water, sanitation, healthcare, education and employment." "We in India are committed to protecting the interests of the poor. We did in it WTO for ensuring food security of our people," he said, adding that the success of India's endeavors in all these issues will also be critical for the success of the global efforts for the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). "Despite our serious resource constraints, we are undertaking ambitious actions to undertake adaptation and mitigation actions, including through lowering of the energy intensity of our economic growth, increasing energy efficiency across sectors and making greater use of renewables," he said. PTI