Pachauri hails budget announcement on climate change mechanism

New Delhi, Feb 29 (UNI) Dr R K Pachauri, head of the UN's Nobel Prize winning climate change body IPCC, today welcomed the announcement in the Budget regarding creation of an institutional mechanism to spearhead new initiatives related to climate change, saying the measure was the need of the hour.

''It is indeed totally relevant, because what is required today is an institutionalised structure for coordinating the range of developments to address the climate change issues,'' he said reacting to the budget.

Dr Pachauri, who is also the Director General of the Energy Resources Institute(TERI), said it was a matter of great satisfaction that the issue of climate change was now part of mainstream policymaking as clearly indicated by the announcement in the Budget last year for the establishment of an expert committee, which has been implemented.

Presenting the Union Budget for 2008-09 in the Lok Sabha, Finance Minister P Chidambaram today said the details of the mechanism would be announced shortly.

Such a mechanism would coordinate the activities of various agencies working for greening the process of development, he said.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had recently announced that a national action plan on climate change would be in place by June.

UNI NAZ MS KP1843