Turkey's first Climate Council, organized by the Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change, was opened in Konya. The opening of the 5-day Council was held with the Youth Session, where Minister Murat Kurum met with the university's climate envoy.
The opening of the Climate Council organized by the Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change in Konya started with the Youth Session. Minister Murat Kurum met with 209 university climate envoys; He thanked young people for their importance in combating climate change and said that the whole world is going through an important turn in the face of climate change.
Minister Murat Kurum, who gave a speech at the opening of the "Climate Council", reminded that Konya, which hosts Turkey's first Climate Council, is the capital of Seljuk Empire, the host of goodness, peace, human values, love of nature, green and blue on earth. Konya is deeply affected by climate change, the agency said, adding that the city faces drought and giant cenotes, risks losing its lakes, but will be successful and pioneering in the fight against climate change as well as the challenges the city has seen throughout history. Minister Murat Kurum expressed his gratitude to Erdoğan for opening the doors of this goal to Turkey, stating that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's speech at the UN General Assembly paved the way for Turkey's "2053 Net Zero Emissions and Green Development Revolution".
Critical Threshold 1.5 Degrees
Noting that climate migrations will create many difficult problems to solve by changing the demographic structure of many countries, and that no state alone has the power to stop it, the Minister said, "There is a very critical threshold in front of the world. That's to keep global warming at the 1.5 degree limit. The 1.5 degree target requires a 45 percent reduction in global emissions by 2030 and a net zero by 2050. The way to achieve this goal is for all countries to reduce by 7.6 percent each year until 2030. At this point, the question is. Can the world achieve this reduction rate? The solution is to establish strong, justice-based cooperation and to equip the spirit of total mobilization. In particular, to achieve rapid, well-planned and wide-ranging transformations simultaneously in the energy, agriculture, industry, transportation and construction sectors. Due to our presence in the Mediterranean Basin, we are among the countries with high risk situations in terms of the potential effects of global climate change."
"Turkey's Duty to Humanity to Fight Climate Change"
Stating that Turkey is not a country responsible for this point of climate change, Murat Kurum continued, "But we have a sensitivity from history. That is our sense of duty to humanity." As a requirement of this awareness, the Minister reminded that they unanimously adopted the Paris Climate Agreement at the General Assembly of the Turkish Parliament on October 6, 2021, and noted that in 2022, Turkey will prepare the "National Contribution Statement and The Long Term Strategy and Action Plan" and submit it to the Secretariat of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
The Future is in Zero Waste
Minister Murat Kurum stated that the Zero Waste movement is of great importance in terms of reducing waste and preventing waste. We have to accelerate the construction of rainwater collection systems with the reuse of wastewater and solid waste. We have to quickly build our infrastructure to increase the use of renewable energy sources in new buildings and to improve green building certification and almost zero-energy building works." Stating that it hopes that the 5-day Climate Council will serve Turkey's Green Development Revolution in the best way, the Institution stated that they will announce the goals they will reach through negotiations and meetings with the final declaration.
Minister Murat Kurum opened an art exhibition showing the effects of climate change within the program and visited the 3D climate tunnel, which dramatically shows the negative effects of climate change.
Climate Council Hosted Many Panels
In line with the 2053 Net Zero Emissions and Green Development goal, turkey's Climate Council, which will form the infrastructure of strategies, actions, policies and legislations, also hosted many panels. In the "Paris Climate Agreement and the International Process in the Climate Regime" Panel, the evaluation of the global steps taken in the fight against climate change after the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26), the future of climate negotiations and the expectations from the implementation phase of the Paris Agreement were discussed. The session was moderated by Prof. Dr. Mehmet Emin Birpınar, Deputy Minister of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change and Chief Climate Negotiator. UK Ambassador Dominick Chilcott, UNSC Deputy Executive Director Ovais Sarmad and Retired Senior UN Director Gaetano Leone were speakers at the panel.
Another panel discussion under the heading "Green Policy" focused on the role, contribution and importance of the parliamentary process in implementing climate change policies and the work of international organizations on green policy issues. UNDP Turkey Resident Representative Louisa Vinton and UNIDO Turkey Representative Süleyman Yılmaz were present at the session moderated by UN Resident Coordinator for Turkey Alvaro Rodriguez.
Commission Meetings were held in 6 Main Topics
"Science and Technology", "Local Governments", "Adaptation to Climate Change", "Greenhouse Gas Reduction", "Green Financing and Carbon Pricing", "Migration Fair Transition and Other Social Policies" were discussed in all aspects of the commission meetings.
