As part of his fourth day of work at the World Economic Forum, Mexican President Felipe Calderón attended a working meeting this afternoon with specialists in climate change and subsequently attended a Round Table with World Economic Leaders: “The Puzzle of Climate Change: assembling the pieces.”
During the first meeting, convened by the Mexican government, the President explained the main aspects of Mexico’s environmental policy for coping with and reducing the effects of this global phenomenon and underlined the need to continue working and increasing efforts to reduce environmental pollution, prevent the excessive exploitation of natural resources and encourage a culture of respect for the environment.
For his part, Yvo de Boer, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Climate Change Framework Convention confirmed Mexico’s important as a hub in international negotiations. He also hailed Mexico’s commitment to halving carbon emissions by 2050, which he regarded as an example of long-term vision in environmental policy.
Internationally-acknowledged specialists attending the meeting included: Al Gore, 2007 Nobel Peace Prize and former US Vice-President; Mario Molina, Nobel Chemistry Laureate 1995; Fred Krupp, President of the Environmental Defense Fund; Professor Jacques Markovitch, ex Environmental President of the World Economic Forum, and Nicholas Stern, author of The Stern Report on the economics of climate change.
During the meeting, the Mexican president exchanged views with the Prime Ministers of Korea and Sweden, as well as top-level representatives of the Ministries of the Environment and Energy, international and private sector organizations, on aspects involving the mitigation, adaptation, technology transfer and financing that will help effectively combat the phenomenon of climate change.
Acting as reporters on the meeting were Tony Blair, UN Representative for the Environment, Kofi Annan, UN General Secretary for the period from 1997-2006 and Al Gore.