G20 a success for China, but hard issues kicked down the road

Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin had a longer-than-expected discussion about whether, and how, they could agree on a deal, a senior USA administration official said. More than 190 countries agreed to adopt the agreement, which sets a goal of limiting a global warming increase to “well below” 2 degrees C. It will require participating countries to devise and maintain national climate plans to curb emissions, which could include the development of, and investment in, more renewable energy.

Both countries will now formally adopt the worldwide climate-change agreement that was first reached in Paris back in December of 2015. As a White House announcement explains, in order for the Paris Agreement to take effect and enter into force, at least 55 countries representing at least 55% of global emissions need to ratify it. There is no trade-off between climate action and development: delivering on the Paris Agreement will help us all implement the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, and vice-versa.

With China’s rising global status and continued economic expansion, it’s expected to play a even stronger role in the worldwide arena.

Advocates for environmental protection hailed the agreement, calling it the brightest moment in relations between the United States and China. China and the USA together represent 38 percent of global emissions. New measures to deal with climate change cannot only smooth pressures from the worldwide community, but also ensure China’s sustainable growth.

Many of us are also committed to the Compact of Mayors and the newly formed Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate & Energy which captures the commitments of more than 7,100 cities in 119 countries representing more than 600 million residents.

As China invests more and more in other countries, it’s increasingly seen as the standard bearer of globalization, advocating free trade and investment. China’s non-fossil energy accounts for 11.2% of the total energy consumed in 2014, 4.4 percentage points higher than 2005.

U.S. President Barack Obama’s press conference on September 5 at the G20 Summit in China.

“We reaffirm the importance of the support provided by the Green Climate Fund”.

“It is high time that the European Union and India, the third – and the fourth-largest emitters, also show they mean business when it comes to limiting the effects of climate change”, it said. Just as the G20 is the world’s premier forum for worldwide economic cooperation, C40 has proven the power of the world’s megacities, both the Global North and Global South, working together to tackle the global threat of climate change.

In 2014 and 2015, both countries issued joint statements about climate change, making a commitment to the rest of the world about their determination to reduce carbon emissions.

In August, 2015, the United Nations released a 2030 agenda for Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) in place of the Millennium Development Goals issued in 2000. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women’s rights, trafficking, property rights and climate change.

The Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon said we are “the last [generation] that can end climate change”. Now is the time to push Germany – the next G20 host – to put axing fossil fuel subsidies at the top of the agenda.