From Delhi Through New York to Paris

By Ramesh Jaura Reprint | | Print |

NEW DELHI, Feb 6 2015 (IPS) -

Credit: Film and Television Unit, TERI

Government leaders from around the world, including current and former heads of state, joined more than 100 corporate heads at the Delhi Sustainable Development Summit (DSDS) in India’s capital city from Feb. 4 to 7, at the invitation of R. K. Pachauri, Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Director-General of TERI, The Energy and Resources Institute.

TERI is the largest developing-country institution, which works towards sustainability and moving from formulating local- and national-level strategies to shaping global solutions to critical issues. This was its 15^th annual summit in a historic year that marks the 70^th anniversary of the founding of the United Nations and holds out the prospect of establishing mechanisms that ensure a harmonious co-existence between human beings and nature in its entirety.

The two landmark events ahead are: the UN General Assembly meeting in September on post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and the 21^st Conference of Parties (CoP21) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in December in Paris, to reach a binding global agreement on halting what is meanwhile being described as creeping climate destruction.

IPS-Inter Press Service News Agency talked to the IPCC chair and TERI chief during the high-level meeting in New Delhi, held less than two weeks after the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

Pachauri pointed out that with global developments moving towards finalization of the Sustainable Development Goals and an agreement on climate change expected at the Paris Conference, there is need for a timely initiative in these areas.

Please visit this link for detailed deliberations of the Delhi meeting.

*Mr Pachauri no longer serves as the Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, resigning on 24th February 2015.