India to Submit Contributions on Reducing Emissions Next Week

Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar at his office in New Delhi. (Reuters Photo)

New York:  India will submit “comprehensive and balanced” Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) on reducing emissions next week to coincide with the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar has said.

“If human intervention has caused climate change, then human instinct and intelligence will bring out solutions,” Mr Javadekar told PTI.

India will submit its INDCs in Bonn on October 1 and will declare it in New Delhi, just in time for the deadline for nations to submit their commitments and coinciding with Gandhi’s anniversary.

Mr Javadekar said Mahatma Gandhi, among the first thinkers on environment, keenly talked about conservation lifestyle and sustainable development and practices.

“India’s INDCs will be comprehensive, balanced and ambitious enough. We are covering mitigation, adaptation and finance technology,” he said.

He said that India’s action will reflect on all fronts including increasing renewables, lowering emission and energy intensity, building resilience capacity in states, having more carbon sync, development of newer technologies and capacity building of vulnerable countries and Least Developed Countries.

He said that India wants to be a part of the solution to climate change.

Mr Javadekar earlier attended a high-level luncheon meeting with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on climate action attended by other heads of state and Foreign Ministers including US Secretary of State John Kerry and French President Francois Hollande.

Mr Javadekar said climate finance will be key to the success of the Paris summit in December on driving at a climate change agreement.

He added that President Hollande has warned developed world that unless they fullfill their commitment of finance, the Paris talks can fail also.

“I complimented him for that warning and said very clearly that finance has to be essentially public finance or non-profit private finance,” he said adding that the seven billion people of the world want some kind of moving forward in climate negotiations.

He said the cost of climate action is not just 100 billion dollars but trillions of dollars and “I cannot make my poor to pay more than his share.”