India pilots resolutions on single-use plastics, sustainable nitrogen management

Context

• India piloted resolutions on two key global environmental issues, single-use plastics and sustainable nitrogen management, at the fourth session of United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) that was held in Nairobi.
• The UN Environment adopted both the resolutions with consensus. The theme of the organisation this year is ‘innovative solutions for environmental challenges and sustainable production and consumption’

Significance

• India’s resolutions to address these two global challenges are the first key steps towards addressing these issues and attracting the focus of the global community.

Why are these two issues global environmental challenges?

• Single-use plastics: Only a small proportion of the plastics produced globally are recycled with most of it damaging the environment and aquatic bio-diversity.
• Sustainable Nitrogen Management: The global nitrogen use efficiency is low, resulting in pollution by reactive nitrogen which threatens human health, ecosystem services and contributes to climate change and stratospheric ozone depletion.

Other Details

• In the high-level segment of UNEA, India hosted a session on “Global Partnerships: Key to Unlocking Resource Efficiency and Inclusive Green Economies”.
• The side event saw participation from representatives of member states, civil society organisations, private sector organisations including leading financial institutions.
• It included a panel discussion that had high-level diplomatic participation from Germany, Brazil, South Africa and senior management of international financial institutions.
• The Indian delegation also participated in the panel discussion on the “need for additional commitments of public finance and the ways to maximise mobilization of climate finance”.

Key takeaways

• At the conclusion of the session, it was realised that the mainstreaming of resource efficiency and the use of secondary raw materials through partnerships and action at scale is critical for moving towards a green economy.
• It was concluded that collaborations and action at scale is the key to success and that the actions should be oriented towards having an inclusive green economy.
• It was also understood that blended finance will help in implementation whereas public finance should be provided to de-risk private finance in transformational projects.

Climate Finance

• It was highlighted during the sessions that climate finance is an important lever for climate action related to both mitigation and adaption in the developing countries and that the contributions to climate finance need to be in consonance with the basic principles of common but differentiated responsibility and respective capabilities (CBDR-RC).
• The discussions concluded that climate finance is more of an obligation of the developed countries, based on their historical emissions. The availability of sufficient, additional and predictable climate finance is a key for action.
• Importantly, the lack of pledged funds in the Green Climate Fund and the potential reliance on the private sector was highlighted by many developing countries.
• India has been initiating domestic climate actions, both related to climate change mitigation and adaptation, primarily through its own financial resources.
• Currently, there is a sense of urgency for financial support to developing countries, which have not been so responsible for these global environmental concerns.

International / the Hindu

Pic courtesy:Jagran Josh