‘Waiving copyrights to enable poor countries access clean technologies’

Islamabad : Exhibiting a strong multi-party consensus, the members of the Parliament hailing from Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaaf, Pakistan People’s Party and Pakistan Muslim League-N pledged to make Pakistan resilient to climate change through sustained adaption and mitigation related climate actions.

They expressed these views in a pre-COP-26 consultative meeting with the parliamentarians organised by Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) here Friday.

O’Flaherty, Regional Ambassador, COP-26, United Kingdom, while terming the level of engagement with parliamentarians quite inspiring said that COP-26’s preparation is on the top priority of the UK government. He asserted that not meeting the target of the Paris Agreement will be catastrophic for the world economies, peoples, and societies.

The consequences of Climate Change are being adversely felt in the climate-vulnerable countries and the developing world including Pakistan, O’Flaherty said adding that mitigation, adaptation, and building resilience are the ways to reduce the effects felt by the world.

Dr. Abid Qaiyum Suleri, Executive Director, SDPI, said that the goal of the Paris Agreement 2015 which was to limit global warming to well below 2 and preferably to 1.5 degrees Celsius, may be missed if urgent action in cutting global carbon emissions is not taken as alarmed by the 6th IPCC report. He said that the major agenda points under negotiation include mitigation, adaptation, climate finance, and technology transfer so that the climate-hit countries are able to build their resilience against the adverse impacts of Climate Change and can come up with their commitments towards “building back better” and “green recovery” to compensate for the damage already done.

He said the technology transfer seems among the key topics at the COP26 negotiation as adaptation and mitigation require climate-friendly technologies. He said the developing countries do not have access to the required technology because of intellectual property rights (IPR). He said the IPR should be waived off so that the developing countries can access clean development technologies in the IPR-free reduced prices.

He said the parliamentarians can play their key role at home while undertaking legislative business in an effort to mainstream Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) and Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) in sectoral policies lining all ministries and departments on CCA/DRR. Those parliamentarians who will be participating in some of the events on the sidelines of the COP26 in Glasgow with their fellow parliamentarians from across the world may raise the issues confronting the developing countries including Pakistan.

Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed, while appreciating the technical presentation said that Pakistan faced diverse kinds of climatic events due to Climate Change and we should demand compensation as “Loss and Damage” for the losses.

Munazza Hassan, Chairperson Parliamentary Committee for Climate Change, remarked that as parliamentarians, it is our responsibility to sensitise the populations about the conventions Pakistan signed and ratified.

Senator Faisal Javed Khan, on the occasion, said that Pakistan achieved a lot regarding climate change adaptation. However, still, it is a long way to go to be better adapted and prepared.