TIB seeks implementation of promised measures for LDCs to counter climate change

The Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) has demanded the implementation of promised mitigation measures and assurance of adaptation funds for least developed countries, the ones most affected by the effects of climate change.

The watchdog has also expressed its support for the ethical movement by schoolchildren around the world against the polluting activities responsible for climate change.

Global school student movement "Fridays for Future" has initiated Global Climate Action Day on September 25, 2020, for the first time, calling on political leaders to take effective steps to ensure the use of renewable energy instead of climate change, mitigation and fossil fuels, reads a press release.

Dr Iftekharuzzaman, the executive director of TIB, said, "Because of the growing global risk of climate change, there is no way to neglect the target set in the Paris Agreement to reduce global warming to at least two degrees Celsius and gradually to 1.5 degrees Celsius as compared to the pre-industrial era."

Dr Iftekharuzzaman believes that due to the current Covid-19 crisis, in the name of reviving the global economy, green recovery has been proposed by industrialised nations, but other countries, including the major carbon-emitting United States, have taken the opposite view. As a result, the risk of global greenhouse gas emissions is growing alarmingly.

Although the Paris Agreement pledges $100 billion a year from 2020 for countries affected by climate change, it has provided little financial assistance in practice, said Dr Zaman, adding that the industrialised nations need to ensure transparency and accountability in the formulation and implementation of fast-track roadmaps for the provision of mitigation grants.

"At the same time, I urge Bangladesh to move away from environmentally destructive activities such as prioritising the use of fossil fuels, instead of implementing the promised mitigation measures," he added.

The TIB believes that the global climate crisis will escalate in the future if the industrialised nations do not ensure the promised compensation of the affected countries and increase the greenhouse gas emissions of the ongoing extinction. Therefore, in line with the Paris pledges of the industrialised nations, the TIB urges schoolchildren to unite and take forward the "Fridays for Future" movement to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions and ensure the promised funds to the affected countries.