This event featured Jairam Ramesh, the chief negotiator for India at the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference held in Copenhagen when he was the minister of environment. He spoke about his predictions for the 2015 conference in Paris and how policymakers face a “trilemma” between the architecture of the agreement, differentiation between countries, and legal implications. A successful agreement coming out of Paris, according to Ramesh, would be “politically feasible, economically desirable, and environmentally optimal.” Since economic growth is the main priority for most countries, and economic growth has been dependent on high carbon emissions, Ramesh predicted that it will be a politically and economically optimal agreement, but not environmentally optimal.
This event was sponsored by the SFS Asian Studies Program and the Georgetown India Dialogue.Jairam Ramesh is a member of parliament in India and was India’s chief negotiator at the international climate change conferences in 2009 and 2010.