Greenpeace urges government for strong climate action plan

New Delhi, June 2 : Activists of the environmental group, Greenpeace, today staged a demonstration in New Delhi urging the Indian Government to come up with a strong climate action plan with accurate timelines.

According to Greenpeace, India, which has recorded 8-9 percent, growth recently, is one of the world's top polluters, contributing around four percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. The activists stressed on the need to reduce harmful emissions.

"We are here to communicate to the Prime Minister that today climate council was supposed to be meeting to discuss the draft of the National Action Plan on climate change. We need a strong climate action plan, which talks about mitigation and Government should come out with targets and time lines. It should not be subjective (and say that) we will invest on solar or renewable sources of energy," Brikesh Singh, a climate campaigner said.

Indian cities might be hugely polluted due to furious pace of industrialisation, still the country's per capita emissions were relatively low at 0.25 tonnes of carbon in 2001, which is less than a quarter of the world average and many times less than the United States of America (USA).

At the same time, India's contribution to world carbon emissions is expected to grow at an average three percent a year until 2025, compared with 1.5 percent in the USA due to ambitious expansion plans in the energy sector.

ANI