“The pandemic has given a lot of challenges but it has given the opportunity to jump-start the economies, rebuild societies through recovery plans and focus on climate change and environment conservation”, Sujit Kumar Bajpayee, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change
New Delhi, August 29: The environment ministry on Friday said one of its senior officials had spoken about the predicted fall in global carbon dioxide emission due to the COVID-19 situation in a virtual session organized by the PHD Chamber. Sujit Kumar Bajpayee, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, was quoted by the PHD Chamber as saying that due to the lockdown, carbon dioxide emissions are predicted to fall down by 8%, during the virtual session organized by the PHD Chamber of Commerce and Industry earlier this week on ‘Paradigm Shift in Business Sustainability: Strategies to Meet the Challenges in the post COVID-19 scenario’.
While clarifying, the ministry said that the official was not just talking about India’s carbon dioxide emission. “Certain media reports have misquoted a ministry official about falling emissions of India’s carbon emissions for 2020. It is clarified that the statement was in the context of predicted fall in global carbon dioxide emission, not the country’s emission, which was reported a couple of months ago based on the Global Energy Review 2020 report of International Energy Agency”, it clarified.
Bajpayee had also said in the session that the COVID-19 pandemic has given an opportunity to jump-start the economies. “The pandemic has given a lot of challenges but it has given the opportunity to jump-start the economies, rebuild societies through recovery plans and focus on climate change and environment conservation”.
Talking about the importance of environment and conservation of natural resources, he said bio-diversity is the foundation of life on earth and gives a connection to human lives and “allows us to grow while catering to our basic, cultural and spiritual needs. We need to realize that our life and livelihood revolves around nature and the environment”, mentioning that nature is an essential source of many medicines and industries like construction, agriculture, food and beverages are highly dependent on it.
