Businesses, academics and civil society join President Bachelet call to fight climate change.
Yesterday the President of Chile, Michelle Bachelet, welcomed Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever by hosting a lunch with leaders from like minded companies and civil society organizations who are actively fighting climate change.
President Bachelet spoke of the need to advance climate action with concrete steps towards the mitigation of climate change and specifically Chile’s commitment to pricing carbon. She made a call for all to get involved, especially, the private sector. Similarly Mr. Polman called for companies to move towards sustainable development policies, and specifically internal carbon pricing. He argued this was essential for the sustainability of our planet and it also makes good sense from a business perspective. Leaders from Chile's most important companies participated, and in this way publicly expressed their commitment to President Bachelet’s climate change policy and the country's Green Tax.
At the lunch, the companies below subscribed a declaration (Spanish) "sending a strong signal of support from civil society and international organizations in advancing climate change action, and carbon price expansion as an instrument for managing climate change mitigation. The signatories also recognize the efforts of the private sector to implement concrete actions for the mitigation of their greenhouse gases, but we hope that they can go further through the voluntary implementation of domestic prices for internal carbon and carbon budgets. We welcome the integration of new members into the Carbon Pricing Leadership Coalition."
- Colbun
- Enel
- Engie
- HSBC
- Poch
- Sodimac
- Statkraft
- Alessandri
- B12
- Enaex
Mr Polman is widely recognized for his commitment to the environment and as a promoter of sustainability initiatives to reduce the environmental impact of the company by 50%.
The executive is in Chile promoting the work of Unilever in the implementation of measures to combat climate change.
Michelle Bachelet, President of Chile, accompanied by the Minister of the Environment, Marcelo Mena, received Paul Polman, Unilever's CEO.
