Partnership with India can boost global climate goals: Norwegian Environment Ministry official

New Delhi, Sep 12 (PTI) Norway and India can cooperate effectively to push for stronger ambitions to tackle climate change, even though the countries are in different parts of the world, a senior official of the Norwegian government said.

In an interview with PTI Videos, Tom Rådhal, Secretary General of the Norwegian Ministry of Climate and Environment, stated that Norway and India have similar goals when it comes to addressing environmental problems, and that government-to-government cooperation is important to them.

"Firstly, bilateral cooperation with India is very important in a world that is a bit 'shakier' today than it was a few years ago. It means a small European country and a large Asian country can talk together about the important aspects in the environmental field.

"Secondly, our visit to India has shown us that our cooperation, when it comes to concrete projects, functions well, and the government-to-government cooperation is very important," Rådhal, who was on a two-day visit to India, told PTI.

Noting that Norway and India are two very different nations, he said the countries could help each other through ongoing bilateral cooperation.

"I want to point out that although Norway is a very different country, in this bilateral cooperation, we might be able to help each other, and the world to be better in the environmental field, especially when it comes to multilateral cooperation," Rådhal said.

The Norwegian government official highlighted that their delegation had a particular focus on renewable energy, which is an important part of India-Norway cooperation.

“We did touch on this (renewable energy) topic to some extent because it's very important to Norway. We have local competence in our country in this field. As a rich Western country, we do have a lot of green technologies at the forefront, and we have been discussing them here in India.

"I was here 10 years ago and we can witness a lot of progress in that field since then,” the Secretary General of the Norwegian Ministry of Climate and Environment told PTI.

When asked about Norway’s priorities for the upcoming Conference of the Parties (COP) - the decision-making body of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)- Rådhal said the focus will be on upholding the Paris Agreement’s 1.5 degrees Celsius temperature target.

"If we reduce the ambitions, we also exponentially increase the problems. Since the US has withdrawn from the Paris Agreement, it's very important that the rest of the world stand together, stronger than ever," the Norwegian government official told PTI.

“Norway and India could cooperate very well in that manner, because we are countries in very different parts of the world, but we do have similar goals, and that is to tackle climate change,” he added.

A Norwegian delegation led by Rådhal attended the 11th India-Norway Joint Working Group meeting with their Indian counterpart - the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change, on September 10.

The delegation comprised officials from the Norwegian Ministry of Climate and Environment, the Norwegian Environment Agency, the Norwegian Ambassador, and the Embassy. The MoEFCC delegation was headed by Additional Secretary Amandeep Garg and joint secretaries, embassy officials said. PTI ABU RHL