Heads of state call for urgent action on climate change

In a high-level delegation meeting at the Fourth United Nations Environment Assembly, co-chaired by Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, and Uhuru Kenyatta, the president of Kenya, heads of state and other senior officials called for urgent action to curb climate change, reaffirming their commitments to speeding up the process.

Macron, Kenyatta and their counterparts from Madagascar and Sri Lanka, as well as Edouard Ngirente, the prime minister of Rwanda, expressed their commitments to speed up climate change actions to meet the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement.

The Paris Agreement's central aim is to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change by keeping global temperature rise this century well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Macron said observations have already been made emphasizing the need to take action even as, for decades, heads of state and governments kept denouncing scientists and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

"IPCC said recently that we are not on course in terms of the Paris Agreement on combating global warming. It's true we have mobilized our forces, but we haven't arrived yet. There is a lot to be done on national and regional levels," he said, adding that an international agenda also is central.

Marcon said young people are becoming impatient with the slow speed evidenced in many governments on addressing climate change and are now pushing leaders and governments to act.

"Young people are saying we are not going fast enough. They are holding demonstrations saying if we can't move fast enough, it means we have a hidden interest. We now must act," the French president said.

He said countries need to be specific in terms of how to reduce emissions in their national strategies and working in partnership with the private sector. "We need to have specific solutions, that is, the One Planet Summit agenda," he said.

Macron said the Nairobi summit was special because it proved that it is not only the Western world that is concerned about climate change and environmental conservation, but also Africa.

"Africa is key in this project because it bears the first direct impact of climate change," he said.

Macron called on countries to invest in renewable forms of energy to reduce their dependence on fossil fuels.

He also said there is a need to change international environmental law and build laws that correspond to collective mobilization.

Kenyatta affirmed Kenya's commitment to achieve a minimum of 10 percent forest cover by 2022 as part of the country's efforts to address the challenge of climate change.

The president said his administration has identified forestry as a key sector of investment in the realization of the country's development agenda and is implementing the national green growth strategy that has set clear restoration targets aimed at achieving the global sustainable development goals.

Kenyatta called for concerted efforts towards environmental conservation, saying forests, like the oceans, are the lungs that keep the planet alive.

"Investment in sustainable management in the conservation of our forests is one of the most effective interventions to combat climate change in Kenya," he said.

Andry Rajoelina, the president of Madagascar, said radical measures are required to curb climate change.

He said governments should work in partnership with the private sector in changing production and consumption methods to curb climate change.

Rajoelina noted that his country is committed to going green in terms of restoring rainforest canopy and investing in green energy.

He added that many initiatives have been put in place to curb climate change and ensure that the country achieves sustainable development goals.

Maithripala Sirisena, the president of Sri Lanka, said his country has taken smart initiatives of policy formulation and implementation towards a green approach, covering land and ocean.

"We are rapidly moving to integrate renewable energy, such as solar, wind and biogas to minimize gas emissions. Sri Lanka is also participating in the United Nation's clean seas campaign," he said.

The president said Sri Lanka was the first country in the south Asian region to prepare a sustainable conservation and production policy through the support of Switch Asia support initiative.

To ensure that the country meets the sustainable development goals, Sirisena said they set up a sustainable development council. The council is mandated with implementing the country's Sustainable Development Act, enacted in 2017, that seeks to formulate a national sustainable development policy and strategy.

Meanwhile, Kenyatta and Macron officially launched the One Planet Summit on Thursday, on the sidelines of the United Nations Environment Assembly.

The One Planet Summit aims to mobilize public and private sectors towards finding a solution to climate change.

Kenyatta said the One Planet Summit, which builds on two previous summits held in Paris and New York, signals a strengthening of cooperation in scaling up environmental conservation and climate action.

At the launch event, big financial pledges to support environmental conservation and address climate change were made.

Kristalina Georgieva, the president of the Interim World Bank, said her institution pledged $12 billion to fund adaptation and resilient climate smart projects in Africa over the next five years.

She assured President Kenyatta that the World Bank will support Kenya's efforts to increase its forest cover by funding the restoration of at least 60 million hectares of forest land.

African Development Bank President Akinwumi Adesina said his bank will commit $25 billion towards climate finance over the next five years to address climate change.