Major Companies to Help Set the Stage for Ambitious Climate Agreement in 2015

Lima, December 9, 2014 /3BL Media/ – On the margins of the UN Climate Change Conference the Caring for Climate (C4C) Business Forum today will bring together nearly 300 CEOs and other senior representatives from the private and public sectors from over 30 countries to showcase contributions that business and investors are making towards climate action.

Co-organized by the UN Global Compact, UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) secretariat and UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and placing a special focus on climate challenges and opportunities in Latin America, the second annual Business Forum serves as an important milestone on the road to Paris (COP21) and helps to set the stage for an ambitious climate agreement in 2015.

Building on the UN Secretary-General’s Climate Summit this September, the Business Forum will help to bring greater scale to business innovation on climate change, encourage Governments to raise ambition on climate policies and foster collaboration among business, investors, Government, civil society and the UN. Through direct engagement with COP20 talks, companies representing a variety of industries and sectors will share solutions and commitments and set concrete action plans and partnerships in pursuit of effective and scalable solutions on climate change.

In his opening keynote remarks, Peru’s Minister of Environment and COP20/CMP10 President H.E. Manuel Pulgar Vidal urged the private sector to take decisive action to address climate change and help develop the new climate economy. He stated, “We need to realize that we are suffering the consequences of climate change...We need to be aware of that to raise our ambition and to act in our role as part of the business sector.”

He further welcomed the private sector’s role in addressing the climate challenge as part of COP20, which seeks to bring together all stakeholders, as well as in broader sustainability issues: “I want to encourage you to continue with your social responsibility, with your environmental responsibility, and also with your climate responsibility. The business sector, when thinking toward the long-term, can adopt the climate responsibility.”

As part of today’s Business Forum, Caring for Climate launched a “Business and Investor Working Group on Carbon Pricing” to build momentum for putting a price on carbon emissions. The working group’s objective is to deepen corporate engagement on carbon pricing and to support companies and investors to become advocates for a well-functioning carbon market at local and global levels. This follows the more than 30 “carbon pricing champions” that committed to take advanced measures on carbon pricing by aligning with the Business Leadership Criteria on Carbon Pricing at the UN Climate Summit.

An interactive panel discussion led by Lord Nicholas Stern, Chair of the Grantham Research Institute, London School of Economics, and featuring corporate representatives from South Africa and Brazil, will provide insight on how Caring for Climate companies are turning the climate challenge into new opportunities and highlight key actions that business can implement to generate ambition in the lead-up to COP21 in Paris.

Additional key announcements and innovative solutions for climate change delivered at the Business Forum include the following:

• The new Mind the Science, Mind the Gap initiative led by WWF, WRI, CDP and the UN Global Compact called on companies to take the lead on climate action by committing to ambitious reduction targets to keep the planet below a 2°C temperature rise.
   
• A status update, Where Do Companies Stand on Responsible Corporate Engagement in Climate Policy?, highlights progress by business toward jointly established guidelines for responsible, positive lobbying on climate policy developed in 2013 by Caring for Climate and five partners. A year later, nearly 30 companies have already committed to follow the Guide for Responsible Corporate Engagement in Climate Policy.
   
• The new Caring for Climate (C4C) Progress Report 2014 examines trends in participation in C4C, emissions performance of companies and progress made against the five commitments. In 2014, 126 Caring for Climate signatories reported 269 targets to reduce their carbon emissions. If the signatories meet their targets, they will reduce their absolute emissions by an estimated 123.6 million metric tons of CO2 from their base years.

“Now is the time for business leaders everywhere to join the race for transformative action that can drive economic competitiveness and a sustainable future,” said Lila Karbassi, Head of Environment and Climate, UN Global Compact, on behalf of Caring for Climate in her welcome remarks. “Through Caring for Climate, the private sector is showing that affordable, scalable solutions are available that will help to leapfrog to cleaner, more resilient economies.”

Four individual sessions on themes related to the UNFCCC agenda and co-convened with partners including UNEP’s Finance Initiative (UNEP FI), PRI, The Climate Group, CDP, UN Foundation, WBCSD, WWF and the Global Compact Network Peru will cover responsible corporate engagement in climate policy; mitigation and finance; adaptation; and science-based targets. A featured lunchtime business leadership panel titled, “The climate has changed in Latin America”, will be convened by the We Mean Business coalition.

On 9 December, chief executives and senior representatives of Caring for Climate signatories will engage in a high-level meeting with Government representatives to distil the outcomes from the first day including examples of leading climate practices, innovations, collaborations and commitments to action across key climate change themes. Featured participants include UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon; H.E. Manuel Pulgar Vidal; Achim Steiner, Executive Director, UNEP and Under-Secretary-General, United Nations; and Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary, UNFCCC. The high-level meeting will distil the outcomes from the first day, discuss the new working group and adoption of the Business Leadership Criteria by companies, and put forward key recommendations for Government actions that would help bring greater scale and quality to corporate climate leadership globally.

Caring for Climate – led by the UN Global Compact in partnership with UNEP and UNFCCC – is the world’s largest voluntary business and climate initiative. It helps to forge stronger alliances between companies and Governments, speed up the delivery of green solutions, scale up climate finance, create jobs and deliver sustainable energy systems on a massive scale.

To learn more about the Caring for Climate Business Forum, held in Lima at the Jockey Club del Peru (8 December) and the COP Venue – Army General Headquarters (9 December), please visit www.c4cbusinessforum.org.

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About Caring for Climate
Launched by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in 2007, Caring for Climate is the UN Global Compact, UN Environment Programme and the secretariat of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change’s initiative to advance the role of business in addressing climate change. It provides a framework for business leaders to implement practical climate change solutions and help shape public policy. Chief executive officers who endorse the initiative are prepared to set goals, develop and expand strategies and practices, and to publicly disclose emissions. The Caring for Climate Business Forum is held every year at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP/CMP), providing a platform for dialogue and action among business, investors, civil society, the UN and Government officials.  Caring for Climate is endorsed by nearly 400 companies from 60 countries. www.caringforclimate.org

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