New Delhi (NVI): New Zealand has declared a climate change emergency and committed to a carbon-neutral government by 2025, as Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern called it “one of the greatest challenges of our time”.
Ardern said the climate emergency declaration was based on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s findings that to avoid more than 1.5 degree Celsius rise in global warming, emissions would need to fall by around 45 per cent from 2010 levels by 2023 and reach zero by around 2050.
“This declaration is an acknowledgement of the next generation. An acknowledgement of the burden that they will carry if we do not get this right and do not take action now,” Ardern told lawmakers in parliament.
Lawmakers passed the largely symbolic emergency declaration by 76 votes to 43 after Ardern urged them to back the move.
New Zealand contributes just 0.17 per cent of global emissions but that is high for its size, placing it 17th out of 32 OECD countries.
Its net emissions have risen by 60 per cent in the past two decades.
The nation’s biggest source of CO2 emissions is road transport but most greenhouse gases stem from agriculture.
New Zealand joins 32 other countries including Japan, Canada, France and Britain that have declared a climate emergency.
Britain’s parliament became the first in the world to declare a climate emergency, passing the motion in May last year, followed closely by Ireland.
-CHK
