PM Mitsotakis at a panel discussion about Striking a Green New Deal at the World Economic Forum

affairs and it is a privilege to chair this session with this very distinguished panel today we have his Excellency kiriakos mitso caucus prime minister of Greece we have his Excellency mark Ruta prime minister of the Netherlands we have first vice-president of the European Commission Franz Timmerman's and the CEO of the Inka group mr. Jesper Broden so around the world political leaders are picking up the mantle and calling for climate action in the US unfortunately the national government has abdicated its responsibility on climate and so sub-national leadership has stepped in to take on this challenge last April New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the New York City green New Deal a fourteen billion dollar initiative with ambitious targets that will ultimately cut emissions by 40 percent by 2030 some of the highlights include requiring all large buildings to conduct retrofits to lower their emissions a global first banning construction of all glass facade buildings unless they meet very strict guidelines converting city government operations to Canadian hydropower etc we are also leading on climate accountability after moving to divest city pension funds about five billion dollars from fossil fuel companies New York City in the City of London and see 40 cities teamed up to create the first-ever divest invest forum to help cities worldwide follow suit now just this week we identified and finalized a selection of advisors who will help develop our divestment strategy now across the globe especially in areas where national governments have been slow to act cities are not waiting in fact more than 1300 local governments in 25 countries around the world have declared a state of climate emergency a critical step in activating immediate comprehensive solutions to drive down emissions encouragingly in some parts of the world leadership is listening and representing the voice of their people and we have you here on stage today so welcome thank you so much I want to start with the first vice-president the Green Deal has very ambitious targets from cutting emissions to investing in research and innovation to preserving the continents natural environment your goal is to make Europe the first carbon-neutral continent an American good luck we are we are rooting for you governments seem to be dragging their feet so I want to know how you think that the you can succeed with the European Green Deal and if you can first give us a little bit of an overview of what your primary targets are please we're even more ambitious than that we want to be climate you too climate is even more ambitious than carbon neutral why are we here because I think everyone saw all the politicians who were in the European elections but this is the one issue that you sort of captures the imagination of Europeans across the continent it's also one of the few issues where nobody doubts that we have to act on a continental scale if you really want to make a difference so what we did is then we went back to the drawing board and said if we want to be climate neutral by 2050 what does that mean for 2040 what does that mean for 2030 what does that mean for the next five years and we started mapping it out and then we we chose a holistic approach so not just one sector it's not just about energy it's not just about you know oil it's it's about whole economy why because we're also in the middle of an industrial revolution that sort of sort of coincides with the climate crisis and we are challenged because of our demographics in Europe you know when my parents were born Europe was about 23 24 percent of the world's population Africa 5% in a couple of years time it's going to be exactly the opposite and in a generations time Africa will account for almost half of the world's population so these are sort of tectonic shifts and the one thing is clear every Industrial Revolution or every fundamental change in our society has the potential of being extremely disruptive and extremely unfair very few people win and a lot of people lose so if you take your role as government seriously you have to organize it together with all the stakeholders this time not on your own because that will work and organize it in a way that it leads to a redistribution that leaves no one behind and and I think that's the the core element of the Green Deal and I'm really very it's very clear without Generation Z without Millennials we would be here they're going to the streets they are shaping the politics of the future they're taking this into their hands and that's a good thing that's wonderful I'm Prime Minister I heard through the grapevine that you are the greenest Prime Minister Greece has ever had I would love to have your thoughts on the Green Deal and what the first vice president said especially in terms of how you see it protecting Greece's extensive coastline and very unique cultural heritage well we're extremely supportive of the Green Deal and I'm happy that it is an ambitious plan as the vice president said it's a plan that is all-encompassing it doesn't just look at one particular sector and what I like is that it unites Europe towards a new extremely important cause if you look at the history of European integration since Europe as a united entity was first created we always put you know very ambitious targets and work towards them you know our fathers or grandfather's created the European Economic Community at the time to ensure prosperity and peace for the continent the euro was a next important milestone it was more about financial robustness but what is the cause that we can actually unite a new generation of young Europeans to work towards it has to be climate in conjunction with technological disruption these are the two big challenges that we have to face so this is a very very ambitious plan who supported it from day one it's particularly important for Greece why because all climate models tell us that the eastern Mediterranean is going to be particularly vulnerable to climate change now this is nothing new I remember we look at the horrible fires in Australia but we had that mega fires in Greece the first mega far that I remember in Greece I was chairman of the Environment Committee in 2007 and at the time we we commissioned a study about the implications of climate change in in Greece and we almost lost a decade so we cannot afford to lose another decade when we address this issues we are a coastal nation our tourism 90 percent of our tourism infrastructure is on coasts are particularly sensitive ecosystems our marine ecosystems so we have an additional reason to deeply care about about this problem and this is not a problem that we will be faced and you know in the future it's already here we see degrees and we have to work towards a very ambitious agenda I'm very happy that the Commission has has proposed it to that extent I think it has been very well received across political families in Europe about of course the real difficulties are going to come once we start committing with your money to it because then there's a question of budget can we still do the same policies that the European Union has always done very well cohesion a common agricultural policy and have additional funds for climate and Technology and of course the disruption that some of the difficult decisions that we will have to take will entail for local communities I'm sure we'll discuss this as we move into into our discussion but it's it's it's nice to be to have young people engaged in this topic but we also have to address people who will lose their jobs as a result of us quickly moving away from our fossil fuel intensive production model another ambitious prime minister in the Netherlands you've agreed to cut emissions by 49 percent by 2030 compared with levels seen in 1990 and you've expressed your willingness to go even further by cutting emissions by 55 percent can you tell us more about the national climate agreement and its goals yeah because it's not easy in analysis we have not been particularly successful in cutting back co2 emissions in the last 10 years yes we and we have not been successful and my worry is that it's the green deals there I'm very happy it's good that we have these ambitious darkus but it all comes down to implementation didn't we need to plan so it first he felt in the Netherlands is that he needed on the one hand the targets we needed to societal support but for example just to sketch out how difficult is it we had regional elections last year in March we were not ready with this climate agreement and basically the only thing we communicated to the electorate was unclarity we couldn't tell them whether to be affordable that conceivable etc and my party was traditionally the biggest party Moscow ending up second-biggest and a new party was the biggest party in that election and in my assessment because we were not ready then by June we were able to strike a deal and I believe now that large part of society is behind it because people sense these are for edible they don't have to sell their houses their cars skip their holidays but it is ambitious this achievable and affordable in grossly here is the fact that we have 150 society organizations on board including Greenpeace and the employers and the unions etc etc we broke it down to all kinds of very specific programs for example one issue and then I'll enter over these two days I have many discussions which the big industry in the Netherlands of course shell being based on allens but also the big chemical clusters - big petrochemical clusters and the big steel mills I don't want them to leave only now to the country I want them to invest in my country to make sure that what they need to do in terms of and they want to do it's the mission in terms of changing their way of production from a high-carbon industry into a low-carbon industry of climate neutrality what whatever they can achieve in a particularly industry like for example electro cracking which is technologically not yet feasible but hopefully in five or ten years what I prefer vessels do we need how do we pitch a co2 co2 levy this is a flat tax I don't believe in that is it an excess levy in terms of the marginal see or two so that you make it conducive conducive for big companies to change their behavior and then come to dialogue with us they want us to be them to be part of that thinking and I am optimistic at the end that if we get this right that you will not have fewer jobs but more jobs more economic growth you are being by far the biggest economy in the world and it's not us the biggest the biggest is Europe America second we are number one in terms of overall economic size if you can get this right it has a huge impact of the rest of the world in terms of job creation and economic growth and of course bringing down the co2 emissions but it's not an easy way ahead and it's almost a list that we all think oh we start to sing the song and we're all very happy and the undervotes internationalism and together we will get there but it's so much to be done and there are so many hurdles along the way and we have to take the whole population with us we could only achieve that it's more economic growth job opportunities will arise that will be crucial as a point of information very briefly it's the Prime Minister's party again came second in the European election we're gonna know but it was such a perfect transition from the prime minister to because i key has been a leader in this right and trying to call me Prime Minister like in the green room I would accept that but I companies that's been leading on climate action in the private sector would love your thoughts your thoughts from my Kia's perspective on the Green Deal but also the larger sectors perspective no but we'd love to share the idea of you on it but I think we are very optimistic this is this was a message and a time that was just perfect and we have most of the work almost all of it ahead of us of course so we're entering a very interesting phase now but I must say maybe France will will disagree with me but sometimes long long back the EU could have been a bit anonymous maybe not known for speed or for a unity and here we are with I think people like you said France Ursula stepping up showing leadership Direction unity and a speed that is phenomenal so we think this is going to be basically a European Orchestra that sometimes have sounded a little bit so show in the past where we need to play all of us and we want to play a part in that we think even we as an industry can be part of playing a big instrument if you give us a small one we will be annoying so hopefully we get something real to play here and I know for sure that there are a lot of companies now the state cameras out there who actually want to we want the speed we are in addicted where maybe it's the most important in the history of mankind really so we have this opportunity now at the same time how can we all participate and be part of it can I ask you to share a few of concrete examples in terms of like what IKEA doing well to say to give a few concrete examples I think first of all our story it's about two things it's about the complete commitment so it's not about symbolic actions mm-hmm it's a 2030 we don't we're not going to take the risk so to say to pass on the changes that needs to happen to the next generation so we're going to be a climate positive by 2030 and we think we know how then when you bring you back the interesting thing maybe to bring to the room also there's a misconception in the world that sustainability will cost and come at a premium if that would happen we will have another crisis the many people as we refer to are not going to be with us on that journey and the thing is when you look at the engineering when you look at innovation it's the absolute opposite in IKEA being a consumer of a lot of raw material the 1900s model is probably not going to be smart going forward we need to have sustainability in order to have low cost the vegetable I give us the example I don't know if you tried the vegetables is very silent sorry was introduced 13 years ago something as an alternative to the excellent Scandinavian meatball share it was taken and the story about the vegetable is that it's of course healthier yeah certainly I think it has about the 6% co2 so that's kind of good or we live streaming this or but I will admit actually run a little bit more money on the veggie ball down on the meatball so there you go you go to LED lighting it's much better business since we moved out incandescent lighting yes our total sales of LED is the same saving in energy as the whole city of Amsterdam in energy our investments in renewable energy which now covers all of our operation in retail and beyond it's a good business so I think we need to create an understanding that sustainability will be the business model 2.0 saying excellent mr. first vice president so we hear a planet of dime and we have to change our ways now the young people are literally shouting it off of the off of roofs right now but many people believe that they have to give up everything so how are we going to handle that what are you gonna say to them well you know the planet isn't dying because the planet was there before we were there and it's going to be there after we've left humanity's at risk I think we should be aware of that you know that that's the big thing we're doing this not for the planet we're doing this for Humanity yeah so that we can recreate sound balance between the planet and us and I believe that that your doom gloom is not going to help us but realism is so we need to follow the science and the science is now explicit and relatively undisputed you know you have a few people who so flat-earthers will always be there but the science is relatively done and we as politicians have the duty to translate that in policies yeah and and that's what we need to do and then you know we are you know the Dutch example shows because the Netherlands have gone further than many other states in mapping out what this means and it shows that once you've mapped it out and then individual citizens understand what it means for them they say whoa wait a minute this is you're asking a lot and if you can then show to them what the end of all of this is right they'll embrace it but if they are insecure about the end whether their kids will still have jobs or you know whether this ends it by them living in caves eating grass you know they will not embrace it but if you can show that this is a transformational agenda that will take us into it better society with cleaner air and and better transport and a more comfortable life and better jobs then they will embrace it but it's a hell of a job yeah to get us there and we need so we need a comprehensive approach and which complicates that we need specific approaches for specific sectors mr. Brodin sector is a different sector than the coal sector or the oral sector or other parts of retail and we need to be very specific on every sector that's actually a great transition you Prime Minister with the lignite coal plants not coal plants that in September you made a commitment to close all of the lignite plants in Greece by 2028 can you talk to us a little bit more about the politics how you got public opinion behind all of this also those of you who don't know lignite is brown coal it's the dirtiest form of coal and for literally 70 years Greece's growth and cheap electricity was fuelled by essentially one Valley in northern Greece has provided you know all the lignite that we that we ever needed who reached the point where we have to take important and pretty drastic decisions we're doing it not just to comply with the targets that we have set at the European level we also do it because burning brown coal in inefficient plants doesn't make economic sense any longer so we have taken the decision to shut down all our lignite fire plants by 2028 we will shut all we shut all of them bar one which is a new one we we inherited it's in the process of being completed by 2023 and of course we're rapidly moving towards natural gas and renewables natural gas as the obvious transition fuel and then a much heavier push into renewables to balance out our our energy mix now the politics was one of those decisions would were were taken and announced without I want to be very honest without a significant degree of public consultation because I felt that there's a new prime minister I need to set the bar very high surprisingly even in regions which are directly affected there is concern but there wasn't you know a completely negative reaction because I think people even on the ground understand that you know they also have to change we were discussing with France before do you want would your kids want to work in a coal mine probably not if you can offer them a better job they would probably prefer that so the real challenge is okay how do we take a region that is very dependent on energy production in terms of jobs and offer these people reasonable alternatives that's where the European Union kicks in you know the just transition fund which aims to mobilize significant amount of capital to help with this transition and what I basically told my colleagues is look the the countries that step up to the plate though we have thirty producing coal producing regions in the European you know those who make the change at a much quicker pace should be should be rewarded and and my intention is to be at you know at the beginning of the queue and not at the end because we always know that you know European funds are relatively finite so we're sending a very clear signal on that fund of course our strategy co2 reduction strategy is not limited just to that we have a very ambitious retrofitting program um for a public but also private homes because our our homes are still relatively old things are tremendous efficiencies that you can get by upgrading upgrading your buildings better insulation better you know better heating better better cooling and we are giving financial incentives and I think we have very good European programs that have worked extremely well in Greece a lot of interest in terms of people upgrading their homes as the real estate market is also picking up there's more interest in investing in your properties we've gone to hotels and told them something you know relative simple we'll give you some additional square meters in terms of public spaces in terms of building rights if you upgrade your your infrastructure in terms of energy efficiency so we're essentially monetizing the you know the transition without us actually paying money so we have a very broad agenda to reduce to reduce co2 but energy production is going to be particularly important and as we map and as the Green Deal is you know is mapping our path towards carbon neutrality we all know which sources of energy production are going to be important natural gas very important the medium term and renewables are very important from day one big question mark is you know what do we do with more innovative technologies hydrogen whether we have a hydrogen strategy as a European Union now it's another topic I think of of great interest but I think sometimes you have to set the bar high and then engage people rather than having everything come out of a public consultation process so I'd like you to reflect on that right so the policies need the citizen buy-in you've done some very ambitious things in the Netherlands and so would love for you to talk about some of the challenges you've faced in trying to get the buy-in from communities you know local sub-national governments around creating these effective policies is difficult there is tradition in my country that we talk absolutely about everything Demi decides and then in the implementation phase we can speed up because you know that this is broad-based buy-in the death is particularly issued at one third of the Netherlands is below sea level I'd like to say God created Earth the Dutch created the Netherlands because they had to reclaim that in over the centuries from the sea Schiphol Airport is four metres below for example the single biggest airport in Europe however given the tradition it's it's very difficult for a government to say we are going to do it by the way in most countries it doesn't work yes I like what you were saying about setting the bar there it will work but look at some countries where is a very central istic system at the end of this Parliament or the street or population in general who will then correct it so at the end it will only slow down the implementation so we to comport everybody had discussions about indeed buildings but are they emitting how can we address that cars so infrastructure in general transportation of course industry which has to add over fourteen point three Megaton in co2 emission reduction to achieve the target by 2030 so that's a big part of it and of course the the general citizens in all kinds of ways as it impacts on society at the end as I said earlier it be took more time than we thought we had to take and and particularly in that phase we found that we didn't have the narrative there and this crucial that when you take so many people on boards that you also have that debate almost on television in the newspapers that it is not just presented and because we were not ready and when things start to leak out and were incomplete it was easier for others to say okay this is nothing it'll mean it's completely to change their lives jobs will be destroyed etc well that's exactly what he didn't want of course the aim of all of these policies is to make sure that we are on the forefront of fighting this problem but at the same time creating that economic opportunity but then again we were successful by June now it is about implementation in the implementation phase again we have to work broad-based that's why I'm spending most of my time here with big industries to try to tell them that we want to be their partners in making that change happen and that we need them to do that because if they just would leave Europe then we can have a border carbon tax or a adjustment text at the border that's great and you but you have a huge leakage of carbon to other parts of the world so we have to address the problem here and make sure that in terms of the newest technologies it is Europe where these technologies are created and implemented and I'm absolutely convinced we can do that excellent um I want to talk about the different role of stakeholders building off of that young people youth activist I know you mr. Brodin have been meeting with young climate activists and I want to know you know the role that idea has in changing consumer behavior this is such an important sort of connection to make and I'm curious what you have to share with us about what you're hearing from the young people yep I think I think we decided to engage basically there is a gap out there there's a lot of anger frustration and I think you've all seen you in September we heard some grown-ups say they got a lot of hope from the the youngsters out I think we get a lot of anger and frustration honestly and from my perspective I see a lot of solutions isolated a lot of things being implemented a lot of hope really but I'm a father of three teenagers and so I have a lot of questions at home and they are well educated in the problems but not in the solutions and the gap Fair is dangerous because it leads to lack of hope and ultimately cynicism and all sorts of things so I think we will just try to continue to listen to each other and when we try that we find that through dialogue we are much closer to each other than we think and that most people actually want to be part of the solution and of the opposite so it's I think one of the elements maybe of the European Green is also to allow that to happen allow different stakeholders to talk to each other without maybe necessarily being overly stressed about the exact solution we will find it if we can only provide those platforms that's what we think right and on the on the Green Deal you know it is so ambitious for Europe but other content continents should be trying to do that and I want to know what kind of advice you have for them but also as an American sitting here right I talked about the sub-national leadership that US cities and states are showing how are you engaging European cities what is that sub-national leadership on climate change how does that get sort of interval then into your strategies well first of all the good thing is that the federal government is not but the Americans are indeed so that makes for a great start General John Allen from Brookings said something brilliant yesterday where he said there's a US leadership and there's American leadership and there has been extraordinary American leadership uncommon so I think I think that's important that's reality and secondly Mike Bloomberg and I co-chair an organization which is called the global government of Mayors and there you can bring together all the best practices from all over the world yes because one of the places where in Europe and globally we need to showcase the fact that we need to make this transition and it can immediately lead to positive results for citizens in cities mm-hmm you know a green in public transport I want to bring together European cities at such a scale that you can tender not a couple of hundred electric buses but 5,000 6,000 you bring the price down and you you create a new opportunity for European industry if you do that I want to see I want to showcase the best examples of greening cities you know we want to plant two billion trees in the next five years but part of that is greening cities and bringing the temperatures in the Mediterranean cities down improving air quality specially in central Eastern Europe you know that 400,000 Europeans died every year prematurely because of bad air quality and cities can show that we can change this relatively quickly and there's a huge political willingness in cities regardless of the political orientation of the city to do this their citizens demand this but I have to add one thing to this the biggest danger of that is and I see I think you see this in America as well as in Europe is that you create a chasm between cities and rural areas I think cities should also feel more responsibilities for the development of rural areas because this industrial revolution has a tendency to favor cities at the expense of rural areas and there we need to also have a system of redistribution because at the end of the day livability in the cities depends on the successful rural area development Prime Minister um I want you to tell us and this is I want to open up some time for Q&A with the audience and so this is going to be a question for all of you Davos here everyone been talking about collaboration engaging other stakeholders in the next year what would you like to see in terms of a collaboration that could help forward your agenda with the Green Deal I think we need more on a domestic level we clearly need broader public discourse about importance of the policies that we are proposing one interesting thing in Greece is that we don't have a Green Party or if it exists it's insignificant politically so I think it is an opportunity certainly for a party that I represent which is liberal center-right party to explain why you can do climate ambitious climate policy in a reasonable way without exaggerating on the one or the or the other end so as far as the targets that we have set you need very specific milestones otherwise there's no way you can reach your target so we've come up with a national strategy on energy and climate that has very specific targets that we hope we will be able to to meet and that's what we will be submitting to the European Union but I think this is also an opportunity to get input from other from other thought leaders we have a it's a great privilege and honor for me to see in in the audience is old His Holiness the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew who has been a thought leader on on green issues way way before decade you know this this problem was was actually was actually acknowledged and I think adding a deeply spiritual dimension to this to this debate not just looking at it from the point of view of cost-benefit whether we look at it as an insurance policy against a terrible future or just as an opportunity but adding a moral dimension to this at this discussion could only to us do as good so let's let's open it up but to two people who we would not necessarily consider to be to be part of the of maybe of the davos entourage and i'm not just talking about you know that your climate activists who sometimes raise the bar so high that is just impossible to to reach it on the same question we always thought our fingers politicians that you have countries and the NGOs and the big concession organizations who have to solve problems I cannot imagine that he can solve this problem without the active participation of the big industries and the big companies and many of them want it's not all of them and many of them want this I think one of the positives of this divorce is that I feel speaking with these companies that like governments they are also telling me that they have spent a little bit too much time on traveling to nice conferences and discussing the need for climate change without actually doing enough and I believe that is now and I am positive about is a tipping point where the governments are stepping up but also the big companies and we need them because they can provide the leadership also in terms of infrastructure take company if you leave for a shell or DSM some of the - examples but you will have them in many European countries and also in America and other parts of the world which have the worldwide network and the infrastructure impact in terms of being able to to roll out necessary policies and to help us and the NGOs /un type of organizations to do this we need that triple approach it's not just it's not just about the companies it's also about the alligator's of capital because that's gonna become even more that is going to come even even more important if you have big pension funds that are looking you know 10 20 30 years ahead I mean they are the ones that would have to put the pressure by their investment decisions on companies even if they're sort of unwilling to change to actually you know engage and discuss seriously about about their trade convince them that this is a way to make more profit on their pensions I would say this as a socialist but Blackrock actually gave a good example so as a big companies what would you want from the folks on this stage I think participation maybe to try some new things that we haven't tried before we sometimes get into our silos and our old ways and manners and I think if we put the problem as an opportunity on the table I'm work a little bit unconventional mm-hmm I think I'm a believer we need to have legislation that supports this carrots and sticks yeah but it tempted for the nature of you takes a bit of time sometimes to make that right yeah but the problems if it take yesterday I started read the study about the circular economy so since 1970 we have doubled the population of the planet and quadrupled the use of resources and the level of recycling has gone down from 9.1 28.7% something so it's not heading in a good direction but the solutions are there and that's good business that's going to be the future business so if we can come around the table and and engineer that future make sure that we don't lead that future from very big review mirrors we could have smaller review mirrors and a big front window and then we will crate that together then I think we will have the same speed as as the Commission has pointed out from the beginning awesome implementation if you want to also can play a positive role for example in autonomous driving this is not your company but I'm just you just remind me of this autonomous driving can be a big force also in terms of making transportation overall a less carbon dependent and one of the things we're trying to do remembrance is to make an answer to a source test market or parts of Netherland photos do I think so I've kind of conversations during these divorce days on this issue but there are also you see that business and governments can help and sometimes you need to tell us what type of regulation you need for you to be able to make these steps then of course the still political position whether it can be done but at least we know what you need and that conversation is crucial hmm and there's one responsibility governments have that they can't shy away from and that's looking at taxes we need to tax carbon and we need to reduce tax on labor this is a shift that needs to happen and most countries are hesitant because it creates insecurity because it creates insecurity in terms of the tax revenue a country or another entity can count on but this is a shift we need to make I don't care how you do it you could put kerosene tax you can expand the ETS system the trading system in carbon you could do whatever but we need to make we need to show that carbon emissions have a cost on society and we need to make the stack shift so that it doesn't mean that people are going just to pay more taxes but we'll have see tax relief in other areas that make it easy for them to work but for the debate because we can offer given a I mean in general this report but you have to do it in such a way that then that's tax on carbon will help the industries to really make the cost of course it's just flat we need to earmark that we need to earmark that and we need to immediately siphon that back into measures that help the transition we could do that you know it's available to us but we need to be nice about the flat tax on co2 compared to a an excess laughing oh yeah and the marginal so that directly it is conducive for companies to be in the in the best of class to be the best in class I think it's more positive than just flat taxes which will then create more income we can then re channel into the sector but that is the government trying to funnel back some money into it one concrete example on this on products we say as European Commission we need legislation that says you look at the best in market in terms of sustainability and that will be the norm and all the rest will be below the norm and will not be allowed in the market that's not a tax but it's a huge incentive for industry to produce the best possible material I think so we have different ways of changing the behavior of producers and consumers so we have a few minutes and I think it's time to open it up to the audience to hear what they have to say who are their Aling allied with on this issue does anybody want to participate with a short comment do we have mics do we need mics yeah thank you I mean I'm Hamza is Donnie I'm a global shaper I'm a lawyer by profession firstly the panel is predominantly European and Europe as a continent has always been relatively more conscious of being greener than at the continents climate change the biggest problem is that it's a one for all all for one situation and because we have the benefit of politicians the biggest problem they face is convincing the population that they have to make certain compromises on their lifestyles as well as the biggest question is who pays for all these incentives a green new deal would require carbon pricing which time and again we have seen because of haggling is never enough to deter carbon emissions or there enough loopholes giving subsidies to greener economies revoking subsidies to people you know other industries so how do we tackle all these and how do you still convince people to vote for you despite the fact that you're willing you know you're asking them to compromise on their lifestyles and it still may not be enough because there are other countries across the world who would not make those changes what certainly would not work I think just two quick answer is for us to lecture the general population on what needs to change I think we have to acknowledge that that is a widespread acknowledgement of the issue that we are basically that the planet is warming up and that we have to do something I think there is a white agreement and Wescott agreement about that and then the question is together with everybody to come to a plan to change that and to take time to implement that plan and and not to all of a sudden force you and me and others to change the lifestyles because that is to fast route to the to the wrong type of populace to take over and then nothing will happen at all and and if you're able to vote for the wrong type of populace because that is not a working policy so sensible political parties in the broad center from left to right or center after work on policies were broad-based societal supports take the time line make sure that it it fits in with the general realization that we have to change things and we have made these transitions in the Netherlands from coal to gas now from gas to renewables we are used I think as societies in Greece in other parts of Europe to go through these societal changes and don't underestimate the speed with which citizens already change their lifestyle give them some credit people are doing this in a massive scale it's still you know it's not the largest part of the population but some leadership has shown by society we I hesitate to say this but it's the truth we don't always need politicians to say you where to go mostly citizens know this by themselves and I see it especially the younger generations are showing us the way ahead in a way that I find deeply inspiring so we have about a minute okay so I'm going to look at my colleague at the forum he is coming out with their mic all right I think this gentleman striking the deal how we mentioned it today and how to divide it because the people are all enthusiastic but as soon as they have to pay we all know the reactions so I am afraid it's still a loose end how do we pay the end because we planning 250 and we have to be sure it had to be paid well you know when when German reunification came about this was a huge task for Germany nobody said how we're going to pay for this people said this is not we need to do and then we'll go and look for ways of making it happen I think we're in the same sort of situation now we can no longer we can no longer afford to say we can't afford to do this we have to do this and on top of that I would say if we organize it well could I get two types of people in my office now industry coming to my office and saying we woke up we smell the coffee we know we need to do this but we're worried because we have trouble getting the investment because the risk is high and our investors are and the banks are a bit hesitant and then I get institutional investors coming to me and saying we've got all this money we don't know what to do with it can you give us some indication where we should invest I mean this is a this is a problem waiting for a solution that should be out there and and I honestly believe I honestly believe we can bring this together if we create synergies both horizontal and vertical within industries and between industries the capital can be mobilized because we're talking about in Europe about 300 billion investment a year and if I then hear what we're still investing per year in fossil fuel it's more than that so we need to have the shift and it will not be a problem I believe to find the capital if we bring things together and we as government's provide some long-term predictability and stability because we are discussing the next multi-annual financial framework and then we'll have to decide whether we can do agricultural cohesion and climate at the same time and agriculture is important because those are the people who will be left behind if you don't if you don't support them so you can't use them at the same time you need clearly need some more money to do the more ambitious climate policies on that fund so my different mark this is certainly going to be a very no but it's an indication of commitment and the private sector I think this is the perfect ending to striking to a session called striking the new Green Deal is that we can no longer afford to not do it thank you all so much for your time today [Applause]

Channel: Ο Πρωθυπουργός

Views: 8,532

Keywords: mitsotakis, davos, green new deal, wef

Id: q5U80dJi3cE

Length: 46min 10sec (2770 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 23 2020