By Harjeet Singh

The writer is Global Lead on Climate Change at ActionAid International and is based in New Delhi. The commitment and sincerity of developed countries to provide climate finance will determine whether the Paris Agreement will succeed in combating climate change, he warns. Views are personal. This article first appeared on ‘India Climate Dialogue’ on 22 June 2018 and is being reproduced with due acknowledgement. – The Editor

NEW DELHI (IDN-INPS) – The home of Shumona, 9, and her grandmother in Patuakhali in southern Bangladesh has been destroyed by storms four times in the past five years. She and millions of climate change victims like her in the developing world remain oblivious to the fact that behind her suffering is unthinking industrialisation.…

By Bradnee Chambers

Marine experts gathered at the United Nations Headquarters in New York from June 18-22, 2018 to discuss anthropogenic underwater noise. Dr. Bradnee Chambers, Executive Secretary of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS), describes the impacts of this type of pollution on marine wildlife and sets out some of the solutions.

BONN (IDN) – Humanity’s achievements are incredible – the Pyramids of Egypt, the Great Wall of China, literature, music, telecommunications, medicine and a few decades after the first powered flight, Neil Armstrong walked on the moon.…

By Monique Barbut

The writer is Under-Secretary General of the United Nations, and the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCDD) based in Bonn, Germany. This viewpoint underlines the importance of June 17 that marks every year the celebration of the World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought (WDCD). – The Editor.

BONN (IDN) – Are you overwhelmed by the depressing news coming at you daily? Conflict, forced migrants, famine, floods, hurricanes, extinction of species, climate change, threats of war … a seemingly endless list. It might surprise you, but you can really make a difference on many of these issues.…

Viewpoint by Franz Baumann

This article is based on Talk given to the UN Association of New York 23 May 2018. Dr. Franz Baumann joined the UN Development Program in 1980 and began working in the UN Secretariat in 1985. He retired in 2015 as an assistant secretary-general, special adviser on environment and peace operations, after working about a dozen assignments under five secretaries-general, in four duty stations and on three continents. Dr. Baumann is now a visiting professor at New York University. – The Editor

NEW YORK (IDN) – The German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, by training a physicist and by temperament not given to hyperbole, last November called Climate Change “the central challenge for humanity.”[1] I will try to explain why this is by no means an alarmist, but an acutely realistic assessment.…

By Jaya Ramachandran

BONN (IDN) – Since the climate negotiations in Bonn failed to pave the way for a successful United Nations climate summit COP24 in Poland in December, an extra round is being convened from September 3-8 in Bangkok.

Commenting the negotiations in Bonn, concluded on May 10, the Least Developed Countries (LDC) Group Chair Gebru Jember Endalew expressed concern at “the lack of urgency” to move the negotiations forward, despite the fact that “it is time to look at the bigger picture, see the severe impacts that climate change is having across the world, and rise to the challenge.”…

By Jutta Wolf

BERLIN | BONN (IDN) – Land degradation has reached staggering proportions. If the current pace continues unabated, a gargantuan amount of $43,000,000,000,000 ($43 trillion) will be lost to the world economy by the year 2050, warns the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD).

But the anticipated colossal loss can be avoided by spending $4.6 trillion on addressing a combination of human-induced processes adversely affecting the biophysical environment and huge stretches of fertile lands.…

By Jaya Ramachandran

BONN (IDN) – Over 700 leading businesses around the world, together representing 2.62 gigatons of emissions equivalent to the total annual emissions of India, have made strategic climate commitments through the ‘We Mean Business’ coalition’s Take Action campaign.

Organizers of the Global Climate Action Summit (GCAS) to be held in San Francisco from September 12-14, 2018 have provided new evidence of how cities, states, regions, businesses and investors are taking climate ambition to the next level. In doing so, they are helping to build momentum for a successful outcome for the UN Climate Change Conference in Katowice, Poland (COP24) from December 3-14.…