President El-Sisi, 
Mr. Secretary General, 
Dear Colleagues, 

We are at a decisive moment in the fight against climate change. 

Over the last few months, we have experienced its dramatic effects throughout Europe, in Pakistan, in the Horn of Africa and in many other regions of the planet. 

We are all called upon to make deeper and faster efforts to protect our planet, our common home. 

In doing so, we will have to keep people at the heart, and transform accordingly, combining environmental, economic and social sustainability. 

Despite a very complex international scenario, already affected by the pandemic and further disrupted by the Russian aggression against Ukraine, Italy remains strongly committed to pursuing its decarbonization pathway, in full compliance with the goals of the Paris Agreement. 

We want to develop our energy diversification strategy in close collaboration with several African countries, with whom we have enhanced our cooperation on energy security, renewables and youth education. This will stimulate green growth, job creation and the development of sustainable value chains. 

In the EU, we plan to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030, and to achieve climate neutrality by 2050 at the latest. 

In this perspective, Italy has recently strengthened its renewable power installed capacity and will accelerate this trend in line with the objectives of REPowerEU. 

We intend to pursue a just transition to support the affected communities and leave no one behind. 

Last year, the Italian G20 Presidency reached concrete results that paved the way for the agreements in Glasgow. As partner of the United Kingdom for COP26, we promoted the “Youth4Climate” event, in order to involve young generations in the decision-making processes on climate change.

Italy has also significantly increased its contribution to climate finance. 

We have almost tripled our financial commitment to 1.4 billion dollars for the next five years, including 840 million euro through the new “Italian Climate Fund”.

This is the first Italian investment platform specifically dedicated to the deployment of clean technologies and to adaptation to climate change in developing countries.

We remain committed to deliver on the 100 billion dollar pledge to support developing countries through 2025 and to define an ambitious and sustainable target thereafter. 

To do so, we must bring together governments, private investors and Multilateral Development Banks to co-share investments and risks, to accelerate a just energy transition.

Italy is proud to be part of the Just Energy Transition Partnerships, an ambitious G7 initiative that will provide substantial financial resources and technical assistance to partner countries.

Recent climate disasters, especially hydrogeological disruption to our territory, show that mitigation and adaptation are two sides of the same coin.

Italy is therefore balancing its financial support to both priorities. In 2020, 56% of our overall climate finance was devoted to adaptation measures, while the remaining 44% went towards mitigation.

Fighting climate change is a common endeavor, which requires the full engagement of all countries and pragmatic cooperation among all major global actors.

Unfortunately, we have to admit that this is not happening. 

We cannot hide the fact that the nations that are most committed to these goals risk paying a price to the advantage of those that, today, are mostly responsible for CO2 emissions on the planet. This is paradoxical, and measures are needed to redress these imbalances.

Our efforts, otherwise, will be vain and the very outcome of events such as the one we are attending today risks not to produce the results that history expects from all of us.

As leaders, we owe this to our future generations, since our commitment to protect the environment as part of our identity is the most vivid example of the alliance between those who are here, those who were here and those who will come after us.

Italy will provide its fair share.

Thank you.