Muted Presence

- Vijeta Rattani & Shreeshan Venkatesh

THE 22ND Conference of Parties (COP22) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC), held in the Moroccan city of Marrakech during November 7-18, was supposed to usher in a new era and play a key role in the implementation of the Paris Agreement. The Agreement, adopted by 195 countries in December 2015, seeks to restrict global warming to 2°C above pre-industrial levels and will come into effect in 2020.

Optimists saw Marrakech as an opportunity to step up immediate efforts to tackle climate change. Even for the realists, who thought of the conference as more of a procedural step towards operationalising the Paris Agreement, the event marked an opportune moment to untangle contentious issues between the developing and developed countries. But by the end, it became clear that if COP22 would be remembered, it would be for the uncertainty that afflicted it. The reason for the uncertainty was largely the result of presidential elections in the US, where Donald Trump, a climate change denier, emerged victorious.

For India, COP22 provided an opportunity to voice its concerns because it is one of the worst sufferers of climate change. Rainfall has reduced, extreme rain events have increased and agriculture is becoming an increasingly precarious livelihood option in India. According to the World Bank, the country is home to 276 million people living on less than US $1.25 a day and 200 million people facing hunger. These are the most vulnerable sections of the society when it comes to climate change impacts. One would imagine that under such conditions, India’s presence at COP22 would be assertive and discernible. The reality, though, was starkly different.