WEF Calls for Systemic Climate Action: Closing the Gap

New Delhi, Jan 11 (PTI) The Alliance for CEO Climate Leaders, a CEO-led community facilitated by the World Economic Forum, on Thursday called on businesses and governments to shift from incremental to systemic actions to meet climate goals.

Among various suggestions, the grouping also urged governments across the world to launch large scale upskilling and reskilling programmes such as India's Skill Council for Green Jobs and the European Skills Agenda.

"This needs to happen while ensuring a just transition by retaining, retraining and redeploying fossil fuel industry workers and by ensuring that the new jobs created are fair and adhere to core labour and safety standards," it said in a report.

The report titled 'Bold Measures to Close the Climate Action Gap: A Call for Systemic Change by Governments and Corporations', published in partnership with the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), said there is a 600-plus giga ton gap in national emissions reduction ambition and policy that needs to be closed to limit global warming to 1.5°C.

It outlined 10 high impact ways for businesses and governments to accelerate decarbonisation and close this gap and said stronger government action is needed.

The grouping also flagged that climate misinformation is still rampant in too many countries.

"About 40 per cent of US and UK citizens deny anthropogenic warming, and between 55 per cent and 85 per cent of people in the US, India, Brazil, Germany, the UK and Australia have at least one false belief about climate change," the report said.

According to the analysis, while individual climate action has increased, collectively the sum is not sufficient to reach the level of systemic change needed.

While COP28 showed new impactful steps, such as the global agreements to triple renewable energy and double energy efficiency by 2030, more is needed to deliver on commitments, the report said.

The Alliance of CEO Climate Leaders consists of more than 120 top companies from diverse industry sectors and regions, representing more than USD 4 trillion in total revenues and 12 million employees.

Necessary critical actions for the net-zero transition will also be discussed by business leaders at a meeting of the alliance during the five-day WEF Annual Meeting beginning Monday in the Swiss ski resort town of Davos.