Saudi Arabia announces several initiatives to curb climate change

Saudi Arabia has hosted the first Middle East Green Initiative Summit in Riyadh, with a pledge to put in place various initiatives to curb environmental damage and climate change.

The summit was attended by a number of Middle East and African leaders and international officials in the environment and climate change sector.

During the summit, leaders and attendees viewed the first set of programs and projects announced by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which aim to contribute to achieving the ambitious goals of the Middle East Green Initiative.

The goals are: supporting efforts and cooperation in the region to reduce carbon emissions and removing them through nature based and adaptation solutions by more than (10%) of the total current global contributions, and the planting of (50) billion trees in the region, thus achieving (5%) of the global target for afforestation, representing the largest tree-planting program globally.

In facilitating achieving the goals of the Middle East Green Initiative, the Saudi Arabia announced during the summit that it will establish an international cooperation platform to implement the concepts of circular carbon economy, establish a regional centre for climate change, establish a regional complex for carbon capture, use and storage and establish a regional centre for early warning of storms to contribute to reducing the associated health risks resulting from dust storms.

"It will also establish a regional centre for sustainable development of fisheries to contribute to

raising marine biodiversity and reducing the level of emissions in the fisheries sector by roughly

(15%), and establishing a regional program for cloud seeding to contribute to raising the level of

precipitation by nearly (20%)," noted a statement from the kingdom.

These centres and programs will have a significant role in creating the necessary infrastructure to protect the environment, reduce emissions and raise the level of regional coordination.

The Kingdom will also work to establish a global initiative to contribute to providing clean fuel solutions to provide food to more than (750) million people in the world, and establish a fund to invest in solutions for circular carbon economy technologies in the region.

The total investment in these two initiatives amounts to approximately (39) billion Riyals; and the Kingdom will

contribute to financing roughly (15%) of it.

In addition, the Kingdom announced the establishment of the Green Initiative Foundation as an independent non-profit organisation to support the summit and raise the level of coordination.

Emanating from the shared responsibility in facing common environmental challenges, the leaders agreed on the importance of joint action to develop a regional roadmap and framework to confront these challenges, and achieving the objectives of the Middle East Green Initiative.

The leaders expressed their appreciation for the Kingdom’s initiatives and its efforts in the field of environment and climate change, and thanked His Royal Highness, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud for his leadership of these efforts and his generous invitation to leaders and officials to this summit, and agreed to form joint working groups, and to hold the summit periodically to develop implementation plans to achieve the objectives of the initiative.