Sustainable Development on the Agenda of Multilateral Institutions
KEY CONCUSIONS
The global environmental agenda is rapidly changing the economy
"Two issues have shown explicit dominance in the last year. These are the modern management of environmental efforts, the cost effectiveness of environmental regulation, and issues related to energy transition and decarbonization," Anatoly Torkunov, Rector, MGIMO University.
"The European Union has decided to revise its climate policy goals for 2030. The original goal was to reduce CO2 emissions by 40%. Instead of the original 40, it was decided to reduce it by 55%. This is a very major change, which actually started the European Green Deal and all things connected with it. The second event was Biden’s victory, which was immediately followed by the United States return to the Paris Agreement. They announced that in 2030 the emissions in the United States will be 50% lower than in 1990, and now they are finalizing the detailed course in this direction. <...> China has officially announced a goal of carbon neutrality by 2060. And for an economy with this rate of growth, it is an incredible challenge of incredible complexity. <...> In addition to that, just a couple of months ago, China opened a carbon exchange. I think it will be bigger in volume than the European exchange," Anatoliy Chubais, Special Representative of the President of the Russian Federation for relations with international organizations to achieve sustainable development goals.
"The 2030 Agenda contains climate issues, but apart from it, it contains a global approach to various problems. Take the goals of sustainable development: they should not be taken into account separately from each other, they are all interrelated. <...> The role of the state is to find the right balance between these different dimensions: economic, environmental, and social," Jacques Ducrest, Delegate of the Federal Council for the 2030 Agenda, Federal Chancellery of Swiss Confederation.
"Last year, without any hype or speculation we have planted 35 million trees. There was a huge number of volunteers involved," Dmitry Kobylkin, Minister of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation (2018-2020).
PROBLEMS
Dependence of the economies of most countries, including Russia, on hydrocarbons
"Today we are in a new phase: the implementation phase of the Paris Agreement. Let me remind you, it provides for limiting temperature increases to less than two degrees. And it would be very nice if it were one and a half degrees. Unfortunately, I have to say that we are still nowhere near that goal. In 2015, we had about 45 gigatons of greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere. Today it is 52 gigatons. Instead of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, we have collectively increased them," Stephane Crouzat, Climate Ambassador, Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs of the French Republic.
"The process [of green transformation - Ed.] is not painless, and in this country it will be more painful than, say, in Europe, due to the fact that 60% of our exports are just carbons. This is 40% of our budget, and 20% of our gross domestic product," Igor Yurgens, President, All-Russian Union of Insurers.
"I would like to highlight the problem of fossil energy subsidies. <...> USD 320 billion is invested annually in this area. Certainly, this impacts the climate, but then it also impacts the society, the economy, and this is a positive impact. So to cancel fossil energy sources or reduce them requires a lot of work. We need to figure out the balance needed to achieve the environmental programme and, at the same time, not to compromise economic development and well-being of the people," Jacques Ducrest, Delegate of the Federal Council for the 2030 Agenda, Federal Chancellery of Swiss Confederation.
"All of us have to make serious effort for sustainable development of the Arctic. It concerns all the projects that are now in the works out there. <...> We are now developing major projects in Yamal, and we are thinking about how in the future we can produce liquefied natural gas while reducing CO2 emissions, how we can invest more in wind energy," Patrick Pouyanne, Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, TotalEnergies.
SOLUTIONS
Making international decisions about energy transition, regulation, and the development of uniform standards to meet global environmental challenges
"The Paris Agreement is a very important one, and only international cooperation can help us solve this international challenge. <...> But when we talk about regulation, aside from talking about bans, we need to talk about incentives, we need to talk about the financial aspects, about investments in climate protection. We also need to talk about support for R&D and support for education on these issues," Jacques Ducrest, Delegate of the Federal Council for the 2030 Agenda, Federal Chancellery of Swiss Confederation.
"The European Union, the U.S. and China are enough for the world to decide on a radical change in all economic policies in terms of the energy transition. The scale of this transformation, in my view, is comparable with the Soviet industrialization or with the Industrial Revolution in Britain in the 18th century. Nothing like this has happened in the world in the last hundred years," Anatoliy Chubais, Special Representative of the President of the Russian Federation for relations with international organizations to achieve sustainable development goals.
"Russia is at the center of our strategies. Gas is a natural energy resource, but it is also a great option for the energy transition, because gas also allows us to generate electricity with much less CO2 emissions. <...> Gas makes this energy transition possible. We must not forget that the energy transition, sustainability, is not only about the planet and ecology, it is about all the men and women who live on the planet. And our challenge is to make this revolution, to make this transition fair, so that the interests of all men and women in every country, including developing countries, are taken into account," Patrick Pouyanne, Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, TotalEnergies.
"Our financial system should be reoriented towards everything green. Investing in green means financing green, but in order to do this, we need systemic instruments: we need green bonds, we need green certificates. We need a taxonomy of this greenness, which among other things is expressed in standards. And this ESG standard, which the Central Bank of the Russian Federation together with the Ministry of Economic Development and VEB Development Bank are implementing now is very important," Igor Yurgens, President, All-Russian Union of Insurers
"It is impossible to do one global thing from different starting positions in a time of sanctions. I think it is very important to pay attention to this, because global challenges should bring countries together, but not divide them – as long as decarbonization is not a game. I think this is not a game, and we are getting there," Dmitry Kobylkin, Minister of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation (2018-2020)
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