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STORY: UN / SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT & CLIMATE CHANGE
TRT: 2.12
SOURCE: UNTV
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 16 MAY 2013, NEW YORK CITY
RECENT, NEW YORK CITY
1. Wide shot, exterior United Nations Headquarters
16 MAY 2013, NEW YORK CITY
2. Wide shot, meeting room
3. Med shot, Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs Wu Hongbo
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute:
“We will pay a price, even in our own time, and we will impose a devastating cost on our children and our children’s children unless we come to grips with this basic reality. And ladies and gentlemen, 21 years after the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, we haven’t even begun to change direction.”
5. Med shot, General Assembly President Vuk Jeremić
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute:
“No place escapes, I don’t care how sophisticated, how rich, how clever you think you are, and they think they are pretty clever on Wall Street, just a mile from here, but they were under water a few months ago. It took one month to restore the power.”
7. Med shot, Mexico delegation
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute:
“We had the hottest month in instrument history in the United States last summer, the hottest year in instrument record, the worst floods, the biggest droughts, and you think we talked about this? Almost not at all, because politics has found a way to keep it off the agenda, we are just happily drilling, fracking, and doing everything else, without taking into account reality.”
9. Med shot, Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber from Saudi Arabia
10. SOUNDBITE (English) Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute:
“All over the world draught leads to famine, leads to war. The Horn of Africa, Yemen, Central Asia, the Sahel, this is not accident. Hungry people fall into violence, terrorists take over, demagogues, desperate people, that’s what happens with drought and hunger, and we are going to have a lot more of this unless we start paying attention.”
11. Med shot, General Assembly President Vuk Jeremić
12. Wide shot, meeting room
American economist Jeffery Sachs said today (16 May) that 21 years after the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, “we haven’t even begun to change direction” in addressing the challenges of climate change.
Sachs, who is the Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University and Special Adviser to Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), said “no place escapes, I don’t care how sophisticated, how rich, how clever you think you are, and they think they are pretty clever on Wall Street, just a mile from here, but they were under water a few months ago” after Hurricane Sandy.
The meeting, “Thematic Debate on Sustainable Development and Climate Change: Practical Solutions in the Energy-Water Nexus,” was part of the commitments made by countries last year at the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20), in which countries pledged to implement measures to integrate the three dimensions of sustainable development—namely economic, social, and environmental.
Sachs said “we had the hottest month in instrument history in the United States last summer, the hottest year in instrument record, the worst floods, the biggest droughts, and you think we talked about this? Almost not at all, because politics has found a way to keep it off the agenda, we are just happily drilling, fracking, and doing everything else, without taking into account reality.”
The world renowned economist spoke about the devastating effects of droughts, including to international peace and security.
He said “all over the world draught leads to famine, leads to war” citing examples such as the Horn of Africa, Yemen, Central Asia and the Sahel.
Sachs said ”hungry people fall into violence, terrorists take over, demagogues, desperate people, that’s what happens with drought and hunger, and we are going to have a lot more of this unless we start paying attention.”
The gathering which featured a host of environment and energy Ministers, as well as a diverse mix of experts that included Sachs and Rajendra Kumar Pachauri, Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and UN officials such as General Assembly President Vuk Jeremić.
Jeremić set the tone for the day-long discussion by telling the participants that scientists have confirmed some of the worst fears with the recent determination that the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen above 400 parts per million for the first time in more than three million years.
