President Joe Biden told world leaders gathered at the global climate summit in Glasgow that catastrophic change could be averted for the next decade, but there was no time to waste.
In a call to set aside delay and inaction, the US leader said an ambitious response to climate change would generate opportunities for jobs and growth around the world.
“Glasgow must be the kick-off of a decade of ambition,” he told the meeting in the Scottish city that was a major world port after the Industrial Revolution.
“We meet with the eyes of history upon us. Every day we delay, the cost of inaction increases, so let this be the moment when we answer history's call, here in Glasgow.”
Mr Biden recalled Donald Trump's withdrawal from the Paris Agreement and offered his apologies for this setback. “I shouldn’t apologise, but I do apologise for the fact the United States, the last administration, pulled out of the Paris Accords and put us sort of behind the eight ball a little bit,” he said.
“We're standing at an inflection point in world history. Climate change is already ravaging the world. It's not hypothetical. It's destroying people's lives and livelihoods.”
It was possible that the work to avert Climate Change could lead to more prosperity, Mr Biden stressed as he sought to motivate the nearly 200 nations at the Cop26 meeting.
“Within the growing catastrophe I believe there's an incredible opportunity – not just for the United States, but for all of us,” he said.
The US has offered $3 billion a year of US finance for vulnerable nations adapt to rising seas, droughts and other consequences of global warming, part of its $11.4 billion climate finance annual offer from 2024.
Antonio Guterres, the UN Secretary General, chided the meeting for the lack of progress on pushing back the global temperature rise. He struck a strident tone, saying that humanity was digging its grave.
“It's time to say: enough,” Mr Guterres said. “Enough of brutalising biodiversity. Enough of killing ourselves with carbon. Enough of treating nature like a toilet. Enough of burning and drilling and mining our way deeper. We are digging our own graves.”
The British Prime Minister Boris Johnson used the host's prerogative to invoke the heroic intervention that fictional spy James Bond might make to avert disaster.
“We are in roughly the same position, my fellow global leaders, as James Bond, today,” Mr Johnson said. “The tragedy is that this is not a movie and the doomsday device is real.”
Having “long since run down the clock on climate change” the only real hope was that technology exists to “deactivate that doomsday device”.
“We have the technology, we can find the finance, and the question for all of us today is whether we have the will,” he said. “All those promises will be nothing but ‘blah blah blah’, to coin a phrase, and the anger and the impatience of the world will be uncontainable unless we make this Cop26 in Glasgow the moment we get real about climate change, and we can,” Mr Johnson said in his opening speech.
The remarks recalled the pronouncement of Greta Thunberg, who mocked the sound bites of world leaders, saying: “There is no Planet B, there is no planet Blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah.”
In what is likely to a be parting shot at a global meeting, departing German Chancellor Angel Merkel said societies, not governments, could save the earth.
“We’re not in the place where we need to be,” Mrs Merkel said. “Action by the state won’t move us forward on its own. Rather, it will take a comprehensive transformation of the way we live, work and our economic activity.”
Activitists and campaigners told the meeting of first-hand experience of climate pressures.
Kenyan environment and climate activist Elizabeth Wathuti said: “We need you to respond with courage to the climate and ecological crisis for these next two weeks, which are so critical for the children, for our species, for so many other living beings. Let us step into our hearts.”
The World Leaders Summit on Monday and Tuesday is designed to send signals to negotiators to set their sights on ambitious targets for accelerated action. Its organisers hope to demonstrate the Paris Agreement framework can deliver increased commitments on finance, emissions and adaptation.
“You all have the power here today to be better. You wield the weapons that can save us or sell us out,” said Brianna Fruean, a Samoan climate activist.
The most likely outcomes are commitments on consigning coal to history, promoting electric cars, reducing deforestation and addressing methane emissions.
Sir David Attenborough, the British broadcaster and climate specialist, urged delegates to put in the effort to bring about a historic breakthrough.
“As you spend the next two weeks debating, negotiating, persuading and compromising as you surely must, it’s easy to forget that ultimately the emergency climate comes down to a single number – the concentration of carbon in our atmosphere,” he said.
“The measure that greatly determines global temperature and the changes in that one number is the clearest way to chart our own story. For it defines our relationship with our world.
“A new industrial revolution powered by millions of sustainable innovations is essential and is indeed already beginning. We will all share in the benefits affordable clean energy, healthy air and enough food to sustain us all. Nature is a key ally. Wherever we restore the wild, it will recapture carbon and help us bring back balance to our planet.”
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Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
What drives subscription retailing?
Once the domain of newspaper home deliveries, subscription model retailing has combined with e-commerce to permeate myriad products and services.
The concept has grown tremendously around the world and is forecast to thrive further, according to UnivDatos Market Insights’ report on recent and predicted trends in the sector.
The global subscription e-commerce market was valued at $13.2 billion (Dh48.5bn) in 2018. It is forecast to touch $478.2bn in 2025, and include the entertainment, fitness, food, cosmetics, baby care and fashion sectors.
The report says subscription-based services currently constitute “a small trend within e-commerce”. The US hosts almost 70 per cent of recurring plan firms, including leaders Dollar Shave Club, Hello Fresh and Netflix. Walmart and Sephora are among longer established retailers entering the space.
UnivDatos cites younger and affluent urbanites as prime subscription targets, with women currently the largest share of end-users.
That’s expected to remain unchanged until 2025, when women will represent a $246.6bn market share, owing to increasing numbers of start-ups targeting women.
Personal care and beauty occupy the largest chunk of the worldwide subscription e-commerce market, with changing lifestyles, work schedules, customisation and convenience among the chief future drivers.
Who is Tim-Berners Lee?
Sir Tim Berners-Lee was born in London in a household of mathematicians and computer scientists. Both his mother, Mary Lee, and father, Conway, were early computer scientists who worked on the Ferranti 1 - the world's first commercially-available, general purpose digital computer. Sir Tim studied Physics at the University of Oxford and held a series of roles developing code and building software before moving to Switzerland to work for Cern, the European Particle Physics laboratory. He developed the worldwide web code as a side project in 1989 as a global information-sharing system. After releasing the first web code in 1991, Cern made it open and free for all to use. Sir Tim now campaigns for initiatives to make sure the web remains open and accessible to all.
More from Rashmee Roshan Lall
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
From Europe to the Middle East, economic success brings wealth - and lifestyle diseases
A rise in obesity figures and the need for more public spending is a familiar trend in the developing world as western lifestyles are adopted.
One in five deaths around the world is now caused by bad diet, with obesity the fastest growing global risk. A high body mass index is also the top cause of metabolic diseases relating to death and disability in Kuwait, Qatar and Oman – and second on the list in Bahrain.
In Britain, heart disease, lung cancer and Alzheimer’s remain among the leading causes of death, and people there are spending more time suffering from health problems.
The UK is expected to spend $421.4 billion on healthcare by 2040, up from $239.3 billion in 2014.
And development assistance for health is talking about the financial aid given to governments to support social, environmental development of developing countries.
Profile
Company name: Marefa Digital
Based: Dubai Multi Commodities Centre
Number of employees: seven
Sector: e-learning
Funding stage: Pre-seed funding of Dh1.5m in 2017 and an initial seed round of Dh2m in 2019
Investors: Friends and family
More from UAE Human Development Report:
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
Ticket prices
General admission Dh295 (under-three free)
Buy a four-person Family & Friends ticket and pay for only three tickets, so the fourth family member is free
Buy tickets at: wbworldabudhabi.com/en/tickets
Blackpink World Tour [Born Pink] In Cinemas
Starring: Rose, Jisoo, Jennie, Lisa
Directors: Min Geun, Oh Yoon-Dong
Rating: 3/5
The Sand Castle
Director: Matty Brown
Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea
Rating: 2.5/5
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
How to increase your savings
- Have a plan for your savings.
- Decide on your emergency fund target and once that's achieved, assign your savings to another financial goal such as saving for a house or investing for retirement.
- Decide on a financial goal that is important to you and put your savings to work for you.
- It's important to have a purpose for your savings as it helps to keep you motivated to continue while also reducing the temptation to spend your savings.
- Carol Glynn, founder of Conscious Finance Coaching
Labour dispute
The insured employee may still file an ILOE claim even if a labour dispute is ongoing post termination, but the insurer may suspend or reject payment, until the courts resolve the dispute, especially if the reason for termination is contested. The outcome of the labour court proceedings can directly affect eligibility.
- Abdullah Ishnaneh, Partner, BSA Law
