{"id":17139,"date":"2021-10-29T07:53:34","date_gmt":"2021-10-29T02:08:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/?p=17139"},"modified":"2021-10-29T12:46:40","modified_gmt":"2021-10-29T07:01:40","slug":"cop26-why-the-climate-change-conference-in-the-uk-is-important-for-nepal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/2021\/10\/29\/cop26-why-the-climate-change-conference-in-the-uk-is-important-for-nepal\/","title":{"rendered":"COP26: Why the climate change conference in the UK is important for Nepal"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Kathmandu<\/strong>: The 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP26, is taking place at Glasgow, a port city in Scotland, UK, from 31 October to November 12. The high-stakes event, called<\/a> \u201chumanity\u2019s last chance\u201d against climate change, will be presided over by most of the world\u2019s high-profile leaders and activists, sans the leaders of China and Russia, two of the world\u2019s largest emitters of greenhouse gases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The mood ahead of the \u201clandmark\u201d summit has been one of oxymoronic hopeless optimism. Not much, after all, has changed in global climate politics since the IPCC unleashed its \u2018code red<\/a>\u2019 report in August this year. The report said that if current trends of fossil fuel consumption continues, it\u2019d be impossible to limit global heating to \u201cwell below\u201d 1.5 degree centigrades compared to pre-industrial times, which was the pledge of the Paris COP21 six years ago\u2014and that extreme and unexpected weather events like the one Nepal recently witnessed<\/a> will become only more frequent and more devastating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Nepal\u2019s emission of greenhouse gases is negligible compared globally, it is the fourth most vulnerable country to climate change, according to UNDP<\/a>. The manifestations of climate change are as clear as day. Climate crisis has<\/a> driven Nepalis away from their villages and rendered<\/a> farmers foodless and penniless. The situation is dire and the stakes high.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Ripe paddy inundated by unseasonal heavy rainfall in Kailali district. (Photo: Pratap Tharu)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Amid this, Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba is leaving for the United Kingdom on Friday to attend the summit. Deuba will travel to Glasgow just a few days after Nepal weathered out disasters wrought by a devastating<\/a> post-monsoon rainfall, which experts have linked to climate change. Over a hundred people lost their lives in the past month alone. Property worth millions, and as many as 325,258 tonnes of ready-to-harvest paddy on 85,580 hectares, according to agriculture ministry\u2019s estimates, have been despoiled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Amid this grim situation, the Nepali delegation is expected to ask strong, uncomfortable questions to world leaders at the summit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The manifestations of climate change are as clear as day. Climate crisis has driven Nepalis away from their villages and rendered farmers foodless and penniless. The situation is dire and the stakes high.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Sanot Adhikari, an environmentalist, says the Nepali delegation should primarily focus on three aspects. \u201cThey should opt for implementing the pledge of the Paris agreement and force rich countries to reduce the emission of carbon,\u201d Adhikari said. \u201cMoreover, the delegates should emphasize on managing sufficient capital, technology, and other resources for climate change adaptation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Binod Bhatta, another environmentalist, echoes Adhikari, arguing that our delegates should focus on pressurizing the developed world to reduce carbon emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bhatta suggests the Nepali delegates present the recent unseasonal rainfall as proof that Nepal is \u201cbearing the brunt of carbon emissions by advanced industrial nations on which it has a negligible role\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs much as the massive carbon emissions by developed nations have greatly affected our country, so has their lack of seriousness in dealing with the climate emergency hurt us,\u201d Bhatta said. \u201cOur delegates should make those developed nations uncomfortable, ask them to follow science and act on it, seek help to adapt to changes, and demand compensation for the damage done.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kathmandu: The 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP26, is taking place at Glasgow, a port city in Scotland, UK, from 31 October to November 12. The high-stakes event, called \u201chumanity\u2019s last chance\u201d against climate change, will be presided over by most of the world\u2019s high-profile leaders and activists, sans the leaders of China […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":17147,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,14,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-feature","category-sdg2030","category-top-stories"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/BBVA-COP26-ppal-1920x1180-1.jpg?fit=1920%2C1180&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcWLTd-4sr","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17139\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}