The President at the UN Climate Change Conference: We have increasingly less time left to deal with the climate crisis

President Gitanas Nausėda, currently in Dubai for the UN Climate Change Conference (COP28), participated on Saturday in a high-level panel of world leaders to present Lithuania’s climate change agenda.

Addressing world leaders, the President said that the climate crisis is one of the most urgent and complex global challenges, as many countries are already experiencing the devastating impact of climate change. According to Gitanas Nausėda, scientific data and forecasts indicate that there is little time left for change; therefore, it is necessary to accelerate actions to fight climate change.

The President pointed out that Lithuania is a perfect example that it is possible to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and continue with steady economic growth. Lithuania’s GDP grew by 85 percent from 1990 to 2021, while emissions dropped by 58 percent. Lithuania aims to become climate-neutral by 2050, with renewable energy as the path to climate neutrality.

“For decarbonization to be successful, it is crucial to engage society as a partner in this process. Therefore, Lithuania pays special attention to the involvement of local communities and municipalities in the planning and coordination processes of renewable energy projects. This contributes to society’s better understanding of the benefits and supports both the goals and their implementation. It is also necessary to allocate sufficient state funding to achieve these objectives,” the President said.

According to Gitanas Nausėda, Lithuania has a unique scheme for remote-producing consumers, allowing everyone to take an active part in the green transformation and become an independent producer fairly and easily. A measure of our success is the growing number of such producers.

“The surplus generation of renewable electricity will allow us to produce green hydrogen. Which, in turn, will be most useful for the decarbonization of our industry, especially for such energy-intensive sectors as fertilizer processing. We all can and must implement our commitments and keep the goals of the Paris Agreement alive. However, this window of opportunity is constantly narrowing,” the President said.

At COP28, Gitanas Nausėda also participated in an event on the impact of climate change on agriculture and food systems, during which Lithuania joined the “Emirates Declaration on Sustainable Agriculture, Resilient Food Systems and Action on Climate Change.”