Prelims: Environment (climate change Funds), Loss and Damage Board, Loss and Damage Fund
Mains: General Studies-III Conservation, Environmental Pollution and Degradation, Environmental Impact Assessment.
Why in the News ?
Developed countries have delayed nominating members to the Loss and Damage Board, hampering efforts to fully operationalise the fund to developing countries in time.
Source: DTE
📌 FYI on Prelims
Common but differentiated responsibilities (CBDR)
- Principle of international environmental law establishing that all states are responsible for addressing global environmental destruction yet not equally responsible.
- The principle balances, on the one hand, the need for all states to take responsibility for global environmental problems and, on the other hand, the need to recognize the wide differences in levels of economic development between states.
- These differences in turn are linked to the states’ contributions to, as well as their abilities to address, these problems.
- CBDR was formalized in international law at the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro.
About:
Loss and Damage Board
- Background: At the 27th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP27) held in Egypt, Parties reached an agreement on providing loss and damage funding to nations most vulnerable and impacted by the effects of climate change.
- At COP28, the fund was formally established and a decision text stated that the fund would be governed and supervised by a board, a decision-making body.
- The board is tasked with setting up a strategic direction for the Fund as well as its governance and operational modalities, policies, frameworks and work programme, including relevant funding decisions.
- The Board will comprise 26 members, 12 members from developed countries and 14 from developing nations.
Loss and Damage Fund
- It is a global financial package to ensure the rescue and rehabilitation of countries facing the cascading effects of climate change.
- The term refers to the compensation that rich nations, whose industrial growth has resulted in global warming and driven the planet into a climate crisis, must pay to poor nations, whose carbon footprint is low but are facing the brunt of rising sea levels, floods, crippling droughts, and intense cyclones, among others.
- It is often categorised as economic or non-economic.
- Economic loss and damage are negative impacts that we can assign a monetary value to.
- These are things such as the costs of rebuilding infrastructure that has been damaged due to a flood, or the loss of revenue from agricultural crops that were destroyed due to drought.
- Non-economic loss and damage are negative impacts where it is difficult or infeasible to assign a monetary value.
- These are things such as trauma from experiencing a tropical cyclone, loss of community due to displacement of people, or loss of biodiversity,”
UPSC CSE EXAMS Corner
Mains: PYQ/FAQ
Q. Describe the major outcomes of the 26th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). What are the commitments made by India in this conference? (2021)
