The two-week UN climate summit (COP26) begins in Glasgow on Sunday, bringing together participants from almost 200 countries to agree on stepping up global action to tackle the climate crisis. This is the most significant international climate conference since the Paris climate conference in 2015. State representatives, international companies and various organisations are gathering in Glasgow together for the first time in two years, since last year’s conference had to be postponed.
“The climate crisis is advancing at a frightening pace, and the internationally agreed measures to tackle it are nowhere near the targets set in the Paris Agreement. The Glasgow summit simply has to deliver ambitious results”, comments JEF Finland’s President Risto Rajala.
“Younger generations already feel let down by decision-makers. Young people’s trust that decision-makers can solve the climate crisis has weakened, which shows, for example, in a growing reliance on direct action. If this despair is allowed to deepen further, there’s a risk that younger generations will sink into hopelessness about their future”, Rajala continues.
At COP26, parties will review the tools for implementing the goals agreed at the Paris climate conference, such as financing and how emission reductions are reported. In Paris it was agreed that the rise in the planet’s average temperature should be limited to 1.5 degrees. According to a report published in August by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), however, that limit is likely to be exceeded as early as the early 2030s. The report estimates that, at the current pace of action, the planet would warm by as much as 2.7 degrees.
“We are on our way to a full-blown climate catastrophe. If we fail to sufficiently curb global warming at the current pace, we will end up living in a less secure, less stable world with much harder living conditions”, Rajala stresses.
States have been expected to tighten their emission reduction targets ahead of the Glasgow summit, since under the Paris climate agreement states agreed to update their climate commitments every five years. The EU tightened its targets earlier this year and committed to cutting its emissions by at least 55 percent by 2030. The EU’s goal is to be the first climate-neutral continent by 2050.
“The EU must take up the leading role that belongs to it in the Glasgow negotiations, and work resolutely to secure ambitious international commitments. Action at EU level is our best chance of saving the planet”, Rajala concludes.