In connection to the release IPCC special report of Global Warming of 1.5 °C the Embassy of Sweden in Hanoi has had the pleasure to have Professor Gustav Martinsson from Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) visiting Vietnam.
Martinsson was a keynote speaker at both the UNDP’s workshop on Climate resilience and Low carbon development at Melia Hotel and VNU-UEB’s Conference on Green Finance.
The Swedish embassy reported that the professor talked about the role of the financial sector in climate change mitigation; more specifically, how we should think when formulating new policies to create incentives for private investments and allocation of capital into green and sustainable technology. Martinsson also addressed the elephant in the room, that subsidies to fossil fuel sector currently is between $300 billion to $5 trillion per year globally: “We should be taxing dirty production and subsidizing clean,” Gustav Martinsson had said.
To strengthen his arguments, Martinsson shared some examples of Swedish political reforms on climate and emphasized the need for structural solutions to the structural issues of climate change.
Sweden currently has:
– Highest carbon tax in the world
– Environment subsidies
– Taxes and fees on energy
– Research subsidies for climate change research
– Green investment funds
– Sustainability law
Source: Embassy of Sweden in Hanoi
