Dealing with climate change is more important than merely adapting to it, says Norway ambassador

Norway's Ambassador to India Nils Ragnar Kamsvag recently shared Norway's experience on dealing with climate change at the International Conference on Climate Change, Water, Agriculture and Food Security held in Hyderabad.

Climate change adaptation is important, but dealing with climate change is more important. We have to try to limit the climate change and take radical steps internationally, stated Ambassador Kamsvag in his opening remarks at the conference.

In his remarks he shared Norway's experience on dealing with climate change. Norway has throughout history dealt with weather and climate in extreme forms. "Flooding, rain, waves, snow, wind - this is not new to us."

"Although Norwegian houses, roads, railways and other infrastructure are built to endure freezing cold as well as withstand heavy rain and snow falls, the conditions are now changing. For instance, the drainage systems are not ready to cope with heavy and intense rain," he added.

"In Norway, municipalities have a wide range of areas of responsibility, ranging from roads to childcare to sewage water treatment to spatial planning. As a consequence, municipalities play a key role in climate change adaptation in Norway. Therefore, the national authorities are trying to level the playing field by providing knowledge to the municipalities. We are supporting research on climate change adaptation, and we are supporting the spreading of that knowledge to municipalities," Kamsvag noted.

Further he shared his experience on his visit to the Balajinagar Thanda village near Hyderabad. The managers at Village Knowledge Centre utilize the Norwegian weather portal www.yr.no to access weather forecast for their villages, which is shared among farmers, locally. This helps them to plan the agricultural operation. He remarked that this is an example where global information exchange works at the grass root level.

The ambassador also explained Norway's stand on international climate policy, "Norway was among the first states that formally joined the Paris Agreement on climate change and aims to be carbon neutral by 2050.