Comment by Nicholas Stern on UK Government announcement of £720 million for the Green Climate Fund

Posted on 20 Nov 2014 in

Welcoming the announcement today by the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change that the UK will donate £720 million to the Green Climate Fund, Lord Stern of Brentford, Chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and the Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy at London School of Economics and Political Science, and President of the British Academy, said:

“It is important that the UK contributes to the Green Climate Fund as it provides a further demonstration that rich countries will provide support for developing countries to cut greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to those impacts of climate change that cannot now be avoided. With this announcement, the UK is making it more likely that there will be a new international agreement on climate change at the United Nations summit in Paris next December. The contribution by the UK to the Green Climate Fund will be multiplied by investments and funds from the developing countries themselves and from other rich countries. Overseas aid for developing countries to make the transition to low-carbon economic development and growth helps to reduce poverty and to secure a cleaner and safer future for everyone, including the UK. To suggest that we must choose between investing in flood defences in the UK or helping international efforts to tackle the greenhouse gas emissions that are causing sea levels to rise along British coasts and leading the heavier rainfall is to misunderstand both the phenomenon itself and the basics of policy. Reducing risk and managing the effects of climate change must go hand in hand. To suggest otherwise is foolish.”

 

 

NOTES FOR EDITORS

  1. Lord Stern is also chair of the ESRC Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy and the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, as well as I.G. Patel Professor of Economics and Government and Director of the Asia Research Centre, at London School of Economics and Political Science. Since July 2013, Lord Stern has been President of the British Academy for the humanities and social sciences. Lord Stern was Second Permanent Secretary at HM Treasury between 2003 and 2007. He also served as Head of the Government Economic Service, head of the review of economics of climate change (the results of which were published in ‘The Economics of Climate Change: The Stern Review’ in October 2006), and director of policy and research for the Commission for Africa. His previous posts included Senior Vice-President and Chief Economist at the World Bank, and Chief Economist and Special Counsellor to the President at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. He was recommended as a non-party-political life peer by the UK House of Lords Appointments Commission in October 2007, and Baron Stern of Brentford was introduced in December 2007 to the House of Lords, where he sits on the independent cross-benches.
  2. The ESRC Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy (http://www.cccep.ac.uk/) is hosted by the University of Leeds and the London School of Economics and Political Science. It is funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council (http://www.esrc.ac.uk/). The Centre’s mission is to advance public and private action on climate change through rigorous, innovative research.
  3. The Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment (http://www.lse.ac.uk/grantham) was launched at the London School of Economics and Political Science in October 2008. It is funded by The Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment (http://www.granthamfoundation.org/).