India, UK business leaders plan joint action to tackle climate change

Mumbai: Business leaders of India and the United Kingdom will draw up a joint action plan to increase co-operation on tackling the issues of climate change.

Taking forward the issue of climate change at the business level, The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and its British counterpart, the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), at a meeting in London, also decided to form partnerships to develop clean coal technologies and carbon sequestration, a CII statement said.

Tackling climate change, facilitating technology partnerships and collaborating on the area of skills development between India and UK are the key elements of CII''s future agenda vis-à-vis the UK.

Other areas of collaboration, it added, would include waste-to-energy and other waste utilisation technologies and renewable energy.

The issues concerning technology cooperation came up for discussion during the three-day visit (June 24 to 26) of 11 CEOs led by CII president Sunil Bharti Mittal.

The CII delegation also met British secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs David Miliband who assured all support to India in adopting clean development technologies.

The secretary of state was appreciative of the delegation''s position of the need for ''common but differentiated responsibility''. During the meeting, Mittal emphasised the need and opportunity for Britain and India to collaborate on clean coal technologies and on the need for carbon sequestration.

The CII delegation also briefed the secretary of state on two major corporate led initiatives in India - the CII-Godrej Centre of Excellence on Green Business and the CII-ITC Centre of Excellence on Sustainability.

During the visit, CII also signed a memorandum of understanding with the Said Business School, University of Oxford for setting up their India Business Centre.