G7 ministers pledge to speed up efforts to actualize Paris climate agreement

Environment ministers from the Group of Seven (G7) nations on Monday in Japan collectively said they were committed to ensuring global climate change would be tackled swiftly in line with a deal struck in Paris last year.

Following a two-day meeting which was concluded Monday in the city of Toyama on the Sea of Japan coast, the ministers adopted a joint statement which affirmed their intentions to actualize the Paris climate accord reached last year and advance the timetable for mid and long-term climate change solutions before the deadline, initially set for 2020.

"As for the Paris Agreement, we were able to affirm our strong political will that the G7 will take the lead toward implementing measures to tackle climate change," Japanese Environment Minister Tamayo Marukawa, chair of the meeting, told a press briefing held along with other ministers earlier in the day.

Under the Paris Agreement, the average in global temperature rise is to be limited to 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, as determined by leading environmental scientists and ecologists, and is considered essential in preventing, or limiting the effects of the serious fallout from climate change.

With energy use often centralized in urbanized and industrial areas, the ministers said that emphasizing the necessity for cities and their municipal as well as national governments to be proactive in sharing innovations that were successfully helping in reducing emissions would be vital to the shared vision of the collective.

Climate change aside, the ministers also adopted a new protocol called the Toyama Framework on Material Cycles, which is aimed at reducing global food waste per capita by 50 percent by 2030. The new framework also covers recycling waste generated from natural disasters, according to the communique released at the conclusion of the two-day talks.

The ministerial meeting in Toyama was part of a number of talks on pertinent global issues that will culminate in the G7 leaders' summit to be held in Mie Prefecture in central Japan and hosted by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on May 26 and 27.