Speaking at a UN climate change conference in Lima, Lila Karbassi, head of Environment and Climate of the UN Global Compact, also called on the world's business leaders to heed² the scientific warnings on climate change. 

 

Karbassi addressed participants at a parallel forum³ to the 20th annual Conference of Parties (COP20) to the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, which Lima is hosting from Dec. 1 to Dec. 12. 

 

The Global Compact -- a UN-led initiative to promote ecological⁴ practices among businesses, especially policies to reduce greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming -- announced the creation of a trade and investment work group to help devise responsible guidelines for carbon pricing and investment. 

 

The organization has 400 signatories in various nations, which annually⁵ report their advances and progress in implementing⁶ environmentally-friendly measures. 

 

"We need to be well informed in order to become fully⁷ aware that there is a problem. Only in that way will we assume the consequences and take action," said Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, Peru's Environment minister and president of the COP20.

 

The world is already suffering from the effects of climate change, said Pulgar-Vidal, stressing the problem does not lie in the future, but must be tackled today.

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