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The National Government announced that the goal of reducing greenhouse gases (GHG) for 2030 is 51 percent. An objective that is already applauded by environmental experts and that faces the enormous challenge of combating the high deforestation and the change in land use.
According to the Ministry of the Environment, it will seek to accelerate the process of energy transition, clean mobility, combat deforestation, protect the Amazon and the moors, among others; although at the moment no details are known about what the strategy will be to reduce its emissions to less than half.
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A total of 29 adaptation measures and more than 30 climate change mitigation measures are expected to be implemented. The final list has yet to be defined and at the December 12 summit, in celebration of the fifth anniversary of the Paris Agreement, it will be explained more clearly.
What is coming is not an easy path, since this roadmap will impact all spheres of society, from the definition of public policies to the economic and industrial development of the country.
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The announcement is part of the update of the Nationally Determined Contribution of Colombia (NDC, for its acronym in English), a commitment acquired by several countries after the signing of the Paris Agreement that serves as a roadmap to curb the effects of the climate change in terms of emissions for the next ten years.
The challenge of deforestation
According to figures provided by the Ministry of the Environment, agriculture, forestry and land use change represent 55 percent of emissions in the country, most of them coming from deforestation (36 percent of the total). It is followed by the energy sector (35 percent), waste management (6 percent) and industrial processes (4 percent).
Manuel Pulgar, leader of the Global Climate and Energy Practice of WWF International assures that “Colombia’s main source of emission is the change in land use due to deforestation. Some point out that the peace agreement and the return of people to their territories creates more pressure on the forest. At the same time, the dedication that the states have put to control of the pandemic, has relaxed control over deforestation ”.
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The deforestation figures are worrying. During 2019 some 158,894 hectares were razed, and in 2018 the figure was 197,159 hectares. The Amazon was the most affected.
Isabel Cavelier, co-founder of Transforma, explained the scope of this activity: “deforesting implies the emission of a huge volume of GHG and also cancels the forest’s ability to absorb and store carbon.”
Former Environment Minister Manuel Rodríguez considers it positive that they want to increase ambition in terms of emissions, a growing trend in several countries. However, unlike these, Colombia must face the obstacle that the origin of these emissions is not the energy and transport sector, but the agricultural sector: “Reducing emissions in the agricultural field implies a very large technological development, which includes transforming agriculture and advising farmers ”.
According to Jimena Puyana, UNDP environment analyst, to reach the goal the country must resort to what experts call “nature-based solutions.”
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“There are many opportunities. Nature-based solutions for Colombia are cost-effective options to achieve the goal. This includes avoiding deforestation, protecting ecosystems, mangroves, moors, wetlands, mobilizing towards renewable energies, among others ”, he said.
Economic impact
One aspect that should be considered, according to Pulgar, is the economic impact of not complying with the reduction of emissions: “It is essential to understand the relationship between climate and economy. The only way to maintain solid economies is with the logic of sustainability. Otherwise, you can run the risk of seeing your export products rejected in markets that are going to be more demanding in relation to the volume of carbon or that the country is a recipient of obsolete technology ”.
An urgent commitment
All experts agree that achieving the 2030 goal will not be an easy task, but according to Cavelier, it is an urgent commitment: “This is a goal that must be met. We are not in a moment of wondering if it can or not, but how we are going to achieve it. We need to reduce GHG emissions by those levels or more. Colombia is setting the bar very high, and it is everyone’s job to work for it, because the alternative is to have a country that is not competitive, with greater climatic impacts and with its devastated economy ”.
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Despite this, for former Minister Rodríguez there are several doubts regarding the Government’s announcement that must be resolved as soon as possible: “I don’t know on what basis that projection is made. The Government must give an explanation about in which areas the reduction will take place and who will pay for it, because that costs. This is an important point that Duque must clarify ”.
Along these lines, President Iván Duque assured: “We are going to commit to a clear, specific and multisectoral agenda so that by 2030 we have a 51 percent reduction in emissions.”
And the goal is doubled. Five years ago, in the first steps for the NDC, Colombia committed to reducing 20 percent of its emissions by 2030 (66.5 million tons of GHG). In the October draft, the target was 25 percent and now it will be 51 percent, that is, some 169.5 million tons less.
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The goal, which will be ratified on December 12 at the summit, was not only classified as ambitious by the Government, but was also applauded by environmentalists, who believe it is a substantial improvement to the draft of the NDC released in the month of October, at the time classified as “shy and undefined”.
Faced with the new challenge, Pulgar says that “the announcement is great news for Colombia, Latin America and the planet. We are at a time when countries must increase their ambition, because it is the only way to meet the goal of being zero carbon economies by 2050, and of not exceeding the temperature by more than 1.5 ° C by the end of century”.
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