World needs new institutions to drive climate action, SDGs: Amitabh Kant

The world needs new institutions to drive climate action and sustainable development goals (SDGs) as organisations such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank are not designed to address these challenges, India’s G20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant said on Friday.

Participating in a discussion on “India’s G20 Presidency – Forging Actionable Agenda for Global South” at the Vivekananda International Foundation, Kant talked about the challenges as India holds the presidency of G20 — an intergovernmental forum comprising 19 countries and the European Union (EU). He said the challenges are “external” and referred to the Ukraine war and the prevailing situation in the West.

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“We have seen the war going on for one year, we don’t know how it will shape up in the coming days. G20 is essentially a consensus building platform,” he said. He said geopolitics in Europe is not improving as the Ukraine-Russia war has been going on for a year and is worsening. Kant said G20 is important as it accounts for 85 per cent of global GDP and 75 per cent of the global trade. “G20 is essentially a consensus building forum, you need consensus on a lot of issues…,” he said. “The world never envisaged that the veto power vested in the five countries in the world in the security council (of the United Nations), which is meant to discuss political issues, will have one of the countries go to war…,” he said.

He said global resources are required to drive climate action and sustainable development goals and pointed out that in Copenhagen Climate Summit, developed countries committed to mobilising USD 100 billion per year by 2020 for climate action in developing countries, “which they have not lived up to.” “There is no shortage of capital in the world but you need new institutions. You need new instruments like credit enhancement, first loss guarantee… This will all require that you truly need to reform institutions like World Bank and IMF which were made post World War 2, and are not designed to take on challenge of both climate action and SDG goals,” he said.

“Our presidency will continue to be action oriented, decisive, and inclusive,” he said. He added that despite all challenges in the world, India is best positioned to advance the cause of G20. India is holding the presidency of G20 from December 1, 2022 to November 30, 2023. India is expected to host over 200 meetings during its yearlong presidency of the influential group which will culminate with an annual summit on September 9 and 10 this year.