4th Nobel Laureates Symposium on Global Sustainability
4C: Changing Climate, Changing Cities
HONG KONG, April 22-25, 2015 — Nobel Laureates from around the world met in Hong Kong and called upon cities to tackle the dual challenge of population growth and climate change and seize the opportunity to lead the transition to sustainability. Cities everywhere need to re-invent themselves if they want to be a safe home for generations to come. National and internationally agreed greenhouse-gas reduction targets need to guide and support local action. The distinguished scientists signed a memorandum at the end of the three-day Nobel Laureates Symposium on Global Sustainability, convened for the first time in Asia and co-hosted by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and the Asia Society Hong Kong Center.
More than 200 participants joined the Hong Kong Symposium, which focused on the role of cities in the face of climate change, under the title “4C: Changing Climate, Changing Cities” – a reference to the fact that global warming, if unabated, will reach four degrees Celsius already by the end of the century. This rapid rise would be unprecedented in the history of human civilization.
Bringing together nine Nobel Laureates, the symposium featured a keynote address by Hong Kong’s Chief Executive C. Y. Leung as well as video messages from World Bank President Jim Young Kim and Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
“We challenge all city governments, innovators, and the private sector to work together to unlock necessary resources and enable evidence-based local action to limit further man-made climate change,” the memorandum reads. Entitled ‘The Great Transformation,’ the memorandum states, “We challenge nations to adopt and meet national targets consistent with the internationally-agreed 2°C guardrail. We challenge national political leaders and policymakers to heed the call – not only from leading scientists and economists – but from their own cities and citizens – to generate a strong, equitable, and science-based agreement at the UN Climate Summit in Paris, in partnership with mayors, business leaders and civil society.”
