UN advisor Sachs: Countries still committed to climate action, despite Trump
Jeffrey Sachs, U.N. Special Advisor on Sustainability and Columbia University Economist Jeffrey Sachs, said that the Trump Administration's attacks against climate science did not affect the commitments of other countries to lower their emissions.
The multilateral approach to sustainability, which includes climate change, is currently facing a difficult time.
Donald Trump, the U.S. president, described climate change in his speech to the United Nations General Assembly last week as "the greatest con job". In November, the U.N. will host its next round on global climate change in Brazil.
Sachs stated that while Trump's remarks "raised eyebrows" in New York, the rest of world is "moving quickly."
Sachs stated that he had not heard directly from any president - and he spoke to many other heads of state. - about how the U.S. abandonment on this issue by Trump has changed their views.
Sachs highlighted the sliding costs of renewable energy. Solar power is only a fraction per watt.
This was "frankly the opposite" of what Donald Trump said yesterday, when he claimed fossil fuels were great and that you are ruining your nation by switching to renewables. He said that it was false, even in the most basic of cost calculations.
Sachs, as director of Columbia University's Center for Sustainable Development (CSD), has long advocated reforms to enable institutions like the World Bank to increase their lending.
Although a reform programme is underway, shareholders of the institutions - mostly richer nations have been reluctant to inject new cash. Instead, they are urging them to squeeze even more from what they already have.
Sachs, however, said that adding more money was not a "heavy lifting" and that other countries like China should be given a larger role in the system of development banks. (Reporting from Katy Daigle, Simon Jessop and Heather Timmons; editing by Rosalba o'Brien.)
(source: Reuters)
