By\u00a0IIASA Director General and CEO Professor Dr. Pavel Kabat<\/a>. This article was originally published<\/a> in the Huffington Post.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n
I was at the Kyoto climate talks<\/a> in 1997. I remember doing the calculations, going through the proposals long into the night. I remember the moment of: “We did it. We have an international, legally binding agreement.” I remember the euphoria.<\/p>\n
More than empty promises?<\/p><\/div>\n
These failures do not mean that Paris <\/a>will just be the next in a string of ineffective climate talks. A global, UN-level agreement on climate change is necessary, and I believe Paris will deliver it. But I do not see it as providing more than a direction. Yes, we will have an agreement, but our unrelenting focus from Paris onward must be on how to implement it. And that will require a major change in our way of thinking.<\/p>\n
Take the Green Climate Fund<\/a>. An excellent initiative agreed at the 2009 Copenhagen climate talks, it assists developing countries in climate change adaptation. But it is designated as “climate change” money. Let’s say a dike in Bangladesh is being extended, will we advise that only 25 cm of the 40 cm extension be covered by the climate fund because technically that is all that is needed for climate change, and the rest is just “general development”?<\/p>\n
Paris is just the beginning<\/p><\/div>\n
To ensure that climate change adaptation and mitigation become integral to development, governance also must change. Future strategy cannot consist only of centralized agencies issuing endless targets. Municipalities and small regions have an important part to play. Local efforts will also be more likely to engage people, because they are closer to personal experiences. In fact, while we scientists and politicians talk in dusty rooms, younger generations are already exploring new, bottom-up solutions, such as crowd-funding and joint ownership.<\/p>\n
Investment from the private sector is also key. In the Earth Statement<\/a>, written by an alliance of 17 global-change scientists<\/a>, including myself, we state that:\u00a0We must unleash a wave of climate innovation for the global good, and enable universal access to the solutions we already have.<\/i><\/p>\n
The next report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change<\/a>, and climate research in general, now needs to get at the real issue: implementation. How do we achieve our goals in the institutional, social, and economic context? That is where the main focus should be.<\/p>\n