November 30th marks the beginning of a major two-week climate summit in Paris. The meeting will be attended by dozens of world leaders will negotiate over ways to slow the pace of climate change.

What is the meeting is all about?

• The meeting goes by several names – the United Nations Climate Summit, the 2015 Paris Climate Conference, or COP21, which stands for the 21st meeting of the Conference of Parties that are part of the United Nations Framework on Climate Change.
• The first COP meeting took place in Berlin in 1995, and the most famous of these was COP3, which resulted in the 1997 Kyoto Protocol to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

Who will be there?

• About 150 world leaders and than more than 40,000 delegates representing 195 countries will attend the conference in Paris.

What is the goal?

• Nations are working toward a global, legally binding agreement that will lower greenhouse gas emissions in order to keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius.
• Once global warming climbs beyond that threshold, they say, the earth’s land, food and water supply would be harmed, endangering the planet’s population.

What’s about COP20?

• The 2014 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said the planet has already warmed by 0.85 degrees Celsius from 1880 to 2012 and could increase by another 1.5 to 4 degrees by the end of the century, compared to 1850.
• At the COP20 meeting in Lima last year, governments agreed to submit their pledges to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

What our Prime Minister said?

• In a blunt warning to rich nations, Prime Minister Narendra Modi Monday told developed countries, which powered their way to prosperity on fossil fuels, that it would be “morally wrong” if they shift the burden of reducing emissions on developing countries like India.
• He asked the developed nations to fulfil their duty to shoulder the greater burden of the fight against climate change.

Climate negotiators are pushing for stronger commitments in Paris as a necessary step toward building the world’s economic future.