 Good afternoon from Geneva. A warm welcome to participants joining us from around the world for today's session on the critical team of mobilizing action on climate change and how to really, really accelerate efforts across public and private sector to meet the Paris climate agreement goals and to avoid the irreversible tipping point. We really have a stellar lineup of panelists, as you can see, to help answer this question today. But first, I'm so delighted to welcome former Secretary of State and those special presidential envoy for climate of the United States of America, my dear friend John Kerry. John has been a leader on climate change for decades. One of the croning achievements that I saw myself, of course, was his role as one of the key architects of the Paris climate accord. President Biden signed an executive order to rejoin the accord on his first day in office, a testament to this administration's commitment to prioritize climate action. Secretary Kerry knows that tackling the climate crisis will require allegiances across political divides to include both the public and private sector, which is why, as we all remember in 2019, he co-founded World War Zero, together with Republican Governor John Cases, to work in a bipartisan and multistakeholder way to tackle climate change. Secretary Kerry, John, he will serve as the president in the president's cabinet and on the National Security Council, showing really the administration considers climate change as a national security concern and in need of global cooperation to turn the tide. So happy to see you, John. The floor is yours. Go ahead. Well, Borga, thank you very, very much. First of all, thank you for the invitation and thank you for a very generous introduction. And may I say you've become a great friend. And as Norway's foreign minister, you're always an extraordinary partner to all of us, your great collaborator. And in your own right, a great renown leader in climate change and ocean conservation, which I personally benefited from enormously the impact of your advocacy when you came to Washington for the first ocean conference. So thank you for that. You were literally a great tag team partner then, and you brought the same determination and vision to your work at the helm of the World Economic Forum. And we thank you. So congratulations on making the conference a success, even during the global pandemic. The scenery has kind of changed, but I think everybody would agree the focus is the same. And you're busy breaking down the silos and bringing sectors and stakeholders together to find the synergies on critical issues. Obviously, I think nothing fits the bill for doing that more than global climate change. And it's been at the top of your global risks report for a number of years now. Three years ago, scientists starkly warned us that we had 12 years in which to make decisions to avoid the worst consequences of the climate crisis. Now, already, we're down to nine years left. And we're into the decisive decade for action and the evidence of urgency is literally all around us. I know it's easy to get a little bit barraged by it all and he almost numb to the warnings. But over Christmas, I read an article by Michael Benson that ought to stop every single one of us in our tracks. He examined photographs from geo stationary satellites and piecing. You could you could see huge plumes of smoke when you saw these pictures from the fires with and I quote him flame vortexes spiraling 200 feet into the air passing New Zealand and stretching thousands of miles into the Cobalt Pacific. And there in plain sight was the result of a disaster so vast that it had already consumed 15 million acres of figure that then would rise to 46 million. And in the end, Australia's fires killed dozens of people destroyed 5,900 buildings and quite likely according to the best science rendered some of the country's endangered species extinct. Benson summed it up with shocking iconographic precision that unfurling banner of smoke said the war has started. We're losing. So in the United States, three storms two years ago, Irma Harvey and Maria cost us $265 billion just to clean up after them. Last year, one storm, $55 billion. Yet in stark contrast, we don't fully fund our Paris commitment of 100 billion a year mobilized for poor nation adaptation and mitigation. So we're here now at this moment, not just because we understand the urgency or because we understand the moral imperative. We're here because we know we can't afford to lose any longer. And action is the one moral economic and scientific imperative worth contemplating. Let me just say to you, President Biden is totally committed to this fight. He understands what we're up against. And that's why he ran on the most ambitious, comprehensive climate platform of any presidential candidate in US history. It's why he made building back better investing in clean energy and clean transportation to create millions of jobs. He made it a pillar of his campaign and now a centerpiece of his presidency. It's the reason today, one week into the job, the President Biden will sign another series of executive orders that continue to advance his climate agenda. First, making climate central to foreign policy planning and national security preparedness by creating platforms to coordinate climate action across all federal agencies and departments by directing his administration to develop a US climate finance plan, as well as a plan for ending international financing of fossil fuel projects with public money and moving to ratify the Kigali amendment to Montreal protocol and by hosting a leaders summit less than three months from now on Earth Day, April 22nd. It is also obviously why he rejoined the Paris Agreement just hours after being sworn in as president. So it's fair to say that he knows we don't have a single moment to waste. And I think all of the members of this panel understand that. He also knows that Paris alone is not enough. Not when almost 90% of global emissions comes from outside of US borders, as it does for most countries in the world. So domestic action cannot possibly be enough if we don't together forge an international strategy to galvanize the world, to drive greater ambition from every country, every sector and ensure that the clean energy future we need is global in scope and scale. The whole world has to come to this table to solve the problem. So we rejoined the international climate effort with humility, and I mean that, and ambition. Humility because we know we've wasted four years in which we were inexcusably absent. Humility knowing that today almost no country and for certain no continent is getting the job done. But we re-enter with ambition knowing that at the COP in Glasgow in November, all nations have to raise our sights together or we all fail together. Our goal in Glasgow is to see all major emitting countries together raise ambition, to not be content with goals 30 years from now, but to lay out roadmaps with benchmarks starting this year to acknowledge gaps where they exist, but to show how we get there. Because we need technology breakthroughs and critically we need to put forward real finance plans to bring the whole world along. Failure is obviously not an option. And that's why ambition is so important because success will actually bring enormous reward in countless measures. We have to get away from this argument that deniers and procrastinators have made that this is a choice between a quality of life or taking care of this challenge. Success means tapping into the best of global ingenuity, creativity and diplomacy from brain power to alternative energy power using every tool we have to get where we need to go. A zero emissions future offers remarkable opportunity for business, for clean green jobs, for economic growth and to use the president's words to build back better from the global economic crisis. Just a few quick examples to demonstrate what this opportunity really is. The highest valued auto company in the world today is Tesla and it only makes electric vehicles. Mitsubishi is building the world's largest zero emission steel plant in Austria. Heidelberg cement is working on a plant in Norway that anticipates capturing all of its CO2 from concrete by 2030. Globally, the cheapest new electric power plant you can install is based on renewables, which explains why it now makes up more than 70% of all new capacity. And green economies are going to generate a remarkable number of new jobs. EU anticipates 2 million of different jobs here in the U.S. until COVID. We had five years of steady growth in clean energy employment with over 3.3 million workers put into jobs across our country. India has seen a five-fold increase in clean energy jobs over the same period. And that's just the taste of the marketplace without limits that awaits us if we get serious. The bottom line, my friends, is I don't think anybody can say, I mean, individual countries have been serious, individual companies have been serious. But as a world, we have yet to be really serious and do what we need to do. And according to most of the recent statistics, emissions globally rose over the years since Paris. And while 2020 obviously saw a small dip because of COVID, they are now again on the rise. And everybody expects a quick rebound unless much more stringent policies are put into place. To be on track and accomplish this, even with a 66% probability of keeping global temperatures from rising more than 1.5 degrees, we need to cut global emissions in half by 2030. What does that mean? It means we have to phase out coal five times faster than we have been. It means we have to increase tree cover five times faster. It means we have to ramp up renewable energy six times faster. It means we have to transition to electric vehicles at a rate 22 times faster. All of that is achievable if we plan, if we invest, and if we tap the forces of the marketplace. Can we do it? We actually can. But not unless we summon greater political will, not unless we harness the full energy of the marketplace, not unless we ask the private sector to help our financial institutions mobilize essential trillions in the innovation and the finance that we need. I believe that's achievable, and like all of you, I can't wait to bring us all together and get us together at whatever fora it is anywhere in the world. There are many of them that are going to take place. We all have to work together. This is a matter of multilateral leadership, not any one country or any one group of people. We all are committed to working with a lot and with the British and Italian Presidencies and making Glasgow exactly what it needs to be, where we have portfolios that add up to net zero emissions, and can't wait to be at it with everybody. Thank you. Thank you so much, John, for that very powerful speech. We know that you will make a huge difference, and thank you also for underlining so strongly that there is no business as usual, and the cost of inaction far exceeds the cost of action. And we've seen this. Look at Salar phone to one tenth the price in 10 years. We'll see more of that and we'll see more jobs. I'm now leaving the floor to the most skilled moderator Rebecca Blumenstein from New York Times, also Deputy Managing Editor Rebecca, floors yours and you have a fascinating panel with the key players in the run up to COP26. Thank you so much for that. And thank you so much, Secretary Kerry, for getting us off to such a provocative start. Secretary Kerry, it's hard to believe that it's been only one week since you started your post as the first US climate envoy. Our climate team at the New York Times has been busy covering a raft of announcements around the world in 2021, most notably, of course, the US returning to the Paris Agreement. We convened this time last year with Freda Thunberg and other key leaders. And today we look forward to hearing from a very prominent panel of CEOs and other leaders to discuss whether it will be enough to avoid that irreversible tipping point. Given the urgency of the moment, I've encouraged all of our panelists to be as blunt as possible. If you have a question, please submit it into Slido using the event code hashtag Davos climate. I'd first like to get some reactions to Secretary Kerry's comments. Yes, for Brodin, you are CEO of Inga Group, which runs IKEA globally about 400 stores. Will the US actions be enough to make up for lost time? And what needs to happen over the next 12 months on climate? I think we're having some issues with the Jesper's connection. Jesper, why don't we return to you Anita Mohamed, your Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations. What is your reaction and the world's reaction to the US reengaging? Secretary Kerry mentioned humility. What are you hoping to see here? Okay, great. Thank you very much. And thank you, Secretary Kerry. It was great to hear you. Welcome back. As you said, with the humility and the courage of conviction hitting the ground running, US leadership is really, really important in seeing the success that actually the ambition was set in 2015. And I remember very vividly that we were doing this with the 2030 agenda as well. And the goal on climate was the placeholder. So great to see you back again. I think really three, we're singing from the same song sheet right now. Everything that you said resonates with us. And I think more particularly the action that one needs to take now get to the right side of history. And I think three very quick points. First, that COP really matters. And this is a pivotal year for making that action happen in COP on the net zero, broadening that coalition. Right now we've got a good 65% of emitters and 70% of the world economy, but we need to get it all. Second, I would say the 100 billion. The 100 billion needs to have a really serious handshake. It's not going to get us the climate action to where we want to be, but it is the handshake that gives people the trust across that bridge for all of us to do the things that we need to do. And it is a public private sector discussion. Article six and of course the NDCs with their increased ambition. And so we look forward to seeing the states with their enhanced NDC on the COVID response. Right now the COVID response is an opportunity, not an excuse for failure. And so really important that the global response on the finance side and on the vaccine vaccines will open up the economy. But more importantly, how we find the liquidity and the fiscal gaps filled by a global response on finance. And that's really a G7, G20 issue that needs to happen now so that we can encourage that leapfrogging into a green transition, creating the jobs and making sure that those energy transitions become a reality and not just an aspiration. The third thing I would say is that, you know, business, investors, oil and gas, and we have them all on this panel, there are huge expectations from supply chains to decarbonization to ensuring that everyone is committing to transparency and net zero. And I think here the voice and the actions around what the states do is going to open up that space and, you know, it'll then be a race to the top. And I think that that's what we need. Missing in the last four years has allowed people to sort of slip and slide and now we're galvanizing and getting us over. So that global, local handshake really important. And maybe, you know, to hear a little bit more about what we're saying about the role of young people, young people in leadership and the cabinet that President Biden has put forward is fantastic to see women there, but really young people at the helm of affairs in the decision making in the actions that need to be taken. So really look forward to this journey, first of all, to Glasgow, but and beyond. Ben Von Burton, your CEO of Royal Dutch Shell, one of the largest oil companies in the world. What is your reaction to the calls for business, particularly oil companies, to do much, much more? And why should we quite frankly trust a company like Shell to meet the Paris Accord? Well, thank you, Rebecca. And thank you very much also Secretary Kerry for the very encouraging remarks you have made. Rebecca, you asked me to be blunt, so I will be blunt. First of all, we're not an oil company. We are an integrated energy company. Of course, we do oil, we do gas, but we do many other things as well, including biofuels, hydrogen, power, etc. I think maybe a few comments to the Secretary's comments earlier on. So, yes, absolutely. The climate change is a priority. I think nobody in his right mind at the moment denies that this is an issue that we need to tackle urgently. Nobody denies for that matter that we need to be actually a net zero energy system. And of course, many companies and countries are making these pledges. And my company has made that same pledge. We will be net zero emissions business, including the emissions of our customers by 2050, if not sooner. But the big challenge, of course, is what does it turn to in terms of actions? Because on the one hand, it's okay to raise ambitions. But if it's not being followed up by meaningful actions, we still have a challenge. And a lot of the ambitions and the actions that we have are currently along the lines of NDCs. And NDCs can only go so far, to be perfectly honest, if I again am blunt. It can tackle the power sector. That's 20% of energy demand in the world. Maybe it can tackle personal mobility and homes. But then we still have two thirds of emissions left in the energy system. And they need to be tackled, I think, by businesses collaborating under the auspices of governments. In my mind, what we need next to a an ambitious approach in Glasgow on NDCs, we need to have a sectoral approach sector by sector of the economy, where suppliers and users of energy come together to figure out how they're going to get their sector to net zero. And that is going to be an even bigger challenge than getting a country to net zero. So having businesses set very specific targets sector by sector, not just countries? Yeah. Alex Sharma, you're going to be heading up the the COP talks in Glasgow. Has your job in the past week simply gotten a lot easier with the US back in the fray? Well, look, I mean, it's fantastic to have the US governed back in that global fight against climate change. And thank you, John, for everything that you and the president have announced so far and all that you will be doing. And I'm really looking forward to working very closely with you and your team. But I think what the panelists have all said is absolutely right. This is a critical year for climate. And at the end of the day, we are in a fight for the very survival of our planet, for humanity, for nature, for biodiversity. And, you know, John talked about Amino talked about, you know, setting out those near term ambitions of 2030 terms of emission reductions. Of course, we want countries to do that. That finance issue, the hundred billion is absolutely totemic. And, you know, it's a matter of trust. We don't countries have to deliver on that. But of course, it's not just public finance. It's also getting private money into tackling climate change. And the final thing I would just say on this particular issue is, of course, ensuring that we get everyone together as part of this campaign, this fight. And it's on all of us, whether it's governments or society or businesses or individuals. What I would say to Rebecca is that I'm encouraged in the sense that I think we are at an inflection point right now where we are seeing businesses, we're seeing governments, we're seeing civil society coming together and actually being aligned on wanting to build back better and build back greener. And, you know, we talked about what can business do. Ben made the point that, you know, this is also an issue for business. Well, you know, businesses are signing up to the Race to Zero campaign, committing to net zero by 2050, working with supply chains. But also as part of that, making sure that they have near-term goals and ambitions to get to net zero. And I just give you one anecdote was that last year we launched in the city of London our finance campaign for COP26. And before I came into politics, I spent 20 years working in finance and banking. And if at that point at the start of my career, you had said to bankers and investors, let's get together, let's talk about climate, let's talk about climate risk, I don't think that many people would have turned up. The Guildhall, those colleagues who know it in the city of London was absolutely packed, standing room only. And I think it shows that, you know, we can do this, we can get this right. And I think for businesses particularly, it's important, they know it's the right thing to do. They know that it's what their customers and their clients want. And ultimately, as we've also heard, it's what drives shareholder values. Just look at the market capitalizations of green economy companies as opposed to traditional economy companies. So I think we have a real chance working together. And this issue about the fact that it is a partnership between government and business. In the UK, we've had Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced last year, at the end of last year, a green industrial revolution, an economic plan for growth. And ultimately, this is about using public money, leveraging in private finance as well, so that we have a cleaner environment. It's underpinned by clean green technologies, as John has said. And of course, ultimately delivering those high quality jobs. We have shown in the UK and other countries have shown that over the last 30 years, you know, in the UK, we've managed to grow our economy GDP by 75%, cut emissions by 43%. Green growth is absolutely possible. And I think if we work together, we can have success. Thank you, Sabesma. You are honorary chairman of Royal DSM, a chemical company that's transitioned to renewables and science. You're also co-chair along with Jesper of the World Economic Forum, CEO Leaders Alliance. Could you talk to me? It all sounds good, you know, business and government working together. But there's skepticism about this. And, you know, a lot of companies say that they care, but you've noticed that there's sometimes a gap between their actions and their words. I think you need to unmute. All right. Thank you very much. Yeah. I think, like we all said, climate change, of course, is threatening us, as Secretary Kerry also mentioned clearly. We are not on track of the Paris Agreement we signed and we developed five years ago, and we need to do that as soon as possible. The majority of the investments even have to come from the private sector and not from the public sector. So we need a strong collaboration, but the private sector really needs to step up. So together with Jesper Brodin and Christian Murmantala of Swiss Ray and Rich Lazar of PCG, we're trying to get the private sector further on board. And what can they do concretely? They should fulfill their part of the Paris Agreement, whether that is science-based targets or clear emission reductions at the end of the day to 2050, the race to net zero. That is one emission reduction. Secondly, being very transparent as businesses on their emissions, but also on the financial consequences of climate impacting their business, like Alok was also saying. And certainly embracing policies that governments can put there to reduce emissions and to come to a low carbon economy, like carbon pricing, etc. And there's all three measures like emissions, transparency, and policies like carbon pricing should go together with innovation investments, with new technologies, and also with stimulating different consumer behavior. That all on the mitigation and preventing climate change. And like Mr. Kerry also said this week, at the climate adaptation as well as mitigation, we need to work on adaptation. And also there the private sector can step up. And this is all a logical scientific answer to what is happening. This is all a logical moral answer, especially the most vulnerable businesses or the most vulnerable people or the most vulnerable states in the world. And it just makes good business sense, like Mr. Sharma was also saying. So businesses should step up. And Rebecca, you and I talked before. We last year had a discussion with many companies for who of you climate change is an important topic. And almost 100% of the company said it's an important topic. And the second discussion, who of you discuss this on a very regular basis, since it's so important in your board. And there we came only to assert. So here, businesses still can step up and have to step up. And I think there's room to do that and a necessity, Rebecca, as well. Thank you. And let's return to Jesper Brodin. It would not be a remote call without some technical issues. So hopefully your sound is back. What are your reactions to the secretary's comments and what needs to happen here over the next 12 months? So let's start with, can you hear me, Rebecca? Yes. Fantastic. Thank you. Now, I was saying here initially that you should have heard the sharing here during the speech from Secretary Kerry. I think this represents a lot of people out there who are giving so much open inspiration for what we're hearing now. I'm going to be brief agreeing with the previous speakers. I would like to say we are at the moment where corporates are yet to commit. There are still a lot of companies that need to commit. And if we go back to the Paris Agreement, probably we should have realized already then that we needed to start the corporate movement much earlier. But this is where we are. The reasons for companies to join, I think, is promising. To start with, there is a spike right now happening both in the consciousness of customers and employees. So if you as a corporate leader don't take a leading position here, you will have an issue in your business. Secondly, when we speak about sustainability, and we think this is important to forefront with, because sustainability is equal to affordability and good business. It is about resource smartness, energy smartness, and thereby low cost. So the sooner we need to get to those investments and hurdles, the better we're going to be at defining the new economy. And that's something that we want to talk to when it comes to government officials. So I would say, even if listening to Feike, we still have a job to be done when it comes to commitment. We will soon be in a place where corporates will be in the how, in the plan. It's tricky. There's a lot of difficult decisions. There are voices from owners all the way through the teenagers at the dining tables. But I think mostly the voices from ourselves being the ones responsible in this important decade to actually make sure we don't pass on this to the next generation. So what we would like to discuss when we get to Glasgow and before in the bilaterals is how we, for example, through the Weff Climate Alliance, can sit down at the table and discuss what type of incentives are needed in order to overcome the hurdles, to make sure that the early investors are benefited, to define that new economy. And perhaps also, which I hear from a lot of colleagues out there, how do we ensure that political cycles don't disrupt the journey? But actually, can we trust that direction from the politicians will be consistent? Because this is something we need to build over more than four or five years together. So these are some of the questions that I've picked up. And finally, maybe to say, I think we believe everybody can be a winner. We believe that there is a responsibility for each one of us now to bring forward the good examples because there are great examples out there. In IKEA, I was just to give a small, this is not a commercial, but just to give one appetite. So I think we took a brave decision back in 2016 to face out all-incarresent lighting. And we are now all LED. It's affordable. It's a good business. And at this point, we are saving the energy amount of the size of Amsterdam actually every year by implementing such an activity. There are many, many more examples of that in the new economy. But I think I stop there and hand over for the conversation to happen. Thank you. Secretary Kerry, as President Barack Obama is Secretary of State, you helped steer the negotiation of the Paris Agreement and get commitments from 200 countries. Now that the U.S. has rejoined Paris, what is the U.S. pledge going to be our nationally determined contribution as the United States is already falling far short of its commitments made during the original pact? Well, Rebecca, let me answer that a couple of ways. Look, we've been in office for five days, I think it is, or something like that. So I can't tell you today what our NDC is going to be, but we will be announcing today and we'll be having a press conference in about an hour here to talk about the executive order the President is putting into place. And it's realistic. It's going to be the most massive mobilization of our government around this issue in history. There will be a climate task force working on it on the White House involving every secretary, all of the agencies. It's a national security issue and so forth. But look, I, you know, there's a tension between sounding like a skull and sounding like a realist. And I just want us all to be realistic. I'm not suggesting anybody on this panel isn't everybody is. These are the people who all are the movers and shakers. But let me say something about Paris, having worked on it as hard as we all did. Paris allowed countries to come and do what they wanted to do. It was the best we could do back then that countries signed up and said, this is what we're going to do. Everybody wrote their own plan. And they didn't really have the kind of transparency and capacity for scrutiny that we have today. But even if we did everything that was promised in Paris, folks, there is temperature is going to rise to 3.7 degrees. That's where Paris left off. And that's just because the conglomeration of all the things that people were willing to do just didn't add up to what we need to do. So what I'm trying to say is we have to go to Glasgow with a view, each of us to hold all of ourselves accountable at a time where we know so much more about what it takes. We are not only not achieving 3.7 degrees today. I mean, if you talk to Johann Rockstrom at the Putsdam Institute or other scientists, and you know, we can't be cherry picking science. You can't sort of say, oh, I believe in the science of climate change, blah, blah, blah, but then stop short when the scientists are telling you, well, here's what's going to happen if you guys don't get your act together. And so we have a responsibility here to come to Glasgow and do what we need to do. And that's why I say we have to have a genuine scrutiny and measurement of what those plans that everybody comes to are going to achieve over what period of time. China has said they're going to do something by 2060, but we don't have a clue really yet how they're going to get there. I hope we can work with China. I hope we'll be able to get China to share a sense of how we get there sooner, obviously in 2060. And China's done a lot. I'm not insinuating the heaven, but they also are funding 70% of the coal-fired power plants around the world in the Belt and Road Initiative. So we have big challenges ahead of us here, and we've got to be honest about them. I also want to point out something else. I left being Secretary of State convinced that no government is going to buy itself or even as a group guarantee that this happens. I think the private sector is the saving entity here, ultimately, because if we do our R&D correctly, if we create the right incentives, if we push the curve on hydrogen, potential hydrogen economies and fuel, if we break through on storage, Bill Gates will tell you we need a miracle, either the miracle of storage, the miracle of fission or the miracle of fusion. A whole bunch of people aren't in that discussion right now, but I think we have to be all of the above in this race to try to achieve a reality about what the challenge is right now. The UN Finance Report tells us, the last one, that we have a finance gap on an annual basis of somewhere between $2.6 trillion and $4 trillion, the amount that will cost if we don't do things now, and the lower and the lower. I'm really looking to the private sector. I think that what we can do, a lot of asset owners, particularly in Europe, and I congratulate Europe, and the Europeans have really kept this moving while President Trump kept us in this hold action, but several major asset owners and asset managers are committed to holding by 2050 investment portfolios and add up to net zero. That's going to be gigantic. I'm sure you've all read Larry Fink's letter, latest letter. It underscores the change that is bubbling up as corporate boardrooms are dealing with ESG and SDGs. I think there's a tremendous amount that we can tap into, investment banks and commercial banks have issued sustainable finance targets. There's disclosure that is coming at us. I think that's terrific. We're related financial risks and opportunities, that's all being widely embraced. Hundreds of companies are endorsing the recommendations of the task force of climate-related financial disclosure, the TCFD. I think there are ways for us to excite the trillions. We need billions and we need trillions. The billions has concessionary to some degree, and we're going to have to fight for that. The trillions, in some cases, may be easier because a whole bunch of these things we have to do, like change our transportation modality or change the way we produce the power or put out more charging stations or their host of projects that are all revenue producing. If they are revenue producing because people are going to buy the service and the product, then we're going to be able to excite the financial marketplace to begin to finance that. That's what we have to do here. We have to do it with a view that we can't accept the fact that we're actually on track. Right now, as we talked today, we're on track to hit 4.1 to 4.5 degrees. Now, I'm not going to argue with anybody whether it's 3.6 or 4.5. They're all catastrophic. We're already seeing what happens at 1.2 degrees, let alone getting to 1.5, and most scientists will tell you they fear we're going to blow through 1.5. We have work to do to keep that 1.5 within our horizon. I think we've got to build an unprecedented partnership which has the ability to bring the private sector as a full partner. The private sector, many of our companies in the United States and some in Europe and elsewhere, China, have huge global footprints. They're footprints are larger than the entire footprint of about 140 nations. Those companies have a huge ability to change that footprint and a great capacity through shareholding meetings and other kinds of things to hold themselves accountable to that. I'm an optimist. I really am. I do believe we can get there, but it will take a warlike enterprise where we are mobilizing, like beef 24s, we're coming off the assembly line every hour. That's how you have to approach this, that we have to get this done, and the whole attitude kind of has to take a shift. Secretary Kerry, just quickly, a lot of the efforts that you're describing so far to date have been voluntary on the part of business. Are you exploring requiring financial institutions to take climate change into account when assessing their exposure and their risks? Are you looking at changes? Well, I don't think we'll need to. I think financial institutions are moving that way themselves because it's the only way to invest prudently. It's the only way to meet risk disclosure standards and to understand that you're doing what a fiduciary has to do. That's one of the reasons why Larry Fink is willing to push his clients. I mean, they manage assets which clients own. They can't just say we're automatically going to do this, but they know that they have an ability to put X trillion dollars into this sector over the next years. The risk disclosure work that we can all do needs to be reasonable. It needs to be thoughtful. It has to be worked through with the private sector, but that could help investors make decisions about risk. It can also help them make a decision about opportunity. The fact is that many, many CEOs have discovered, and you just heard about an energy company versus an oil company, they've discovered that there's a lot of money to be made in this transition. This is the largest market the world has ever known. I mean, there are four and a half billion, five billion users today of energy in one form or another. That's going to go up to nine billion in the next 30 years. And there are billion people that don't even have electricity today. That's the largest market the world has ever known. And I believe market principles are going to help us to move faster than we even imagine. We've seen it in solar, we've seen it in wind, the price coming down, the technology rising and gaining in capacity. I'm a believer in hydrogen. I think hydrogen, when we figure out how to make sure we're green in the hydrogen, which we can do, we'll get there. And as I said, I think we're in all of the above stage because we are so far behind. Ben, what is your reaction to the Biden administration's proposal to explore a ban on new drilling? And why should there be new drilling in a sense as we're trying to phase out fossil fuels? Because we haven't begun to exploit the other alternatives nearly enough to be at a point where we say, let's keep doing what makes us sick and kills us and adds to the problem. We don't need to do that. We have a huge ability to deploy more renewable, various other alternatives, geothermal. As in Iceland recently, they obviously have a particular geographic capacity to be able to do it, but they're 100% renewable production. And they have companies in China today helping China to figure out how they could tap into more geothermal. So if we all work together to promulgate information and possibilities and push, you're going to find new startups, new innovators, the next generation of Bill Gates' and Sergey Brans and so forth are going to find what we're looking for. I really feel confident in it. Can you take us from here to there? Do you support the potential ban on new drilling? Well, it's an interesting point and we'd be very interested, of course, to hear what the long-term plans with the Biden administration are going to be. We support the net zero plan, so it is out there and we will work with the Secretary, with the President, with all the institutions in the United States to help the transition in the United States. It's a very important country for us. It's about a third of our business. But again, in the spirit of being blunt and straightforward, I think I was going to be a whole lot more impressed if the place was to actually not use hydrocarbons rather than to not produce hydrocarbons because that really is the challenge. There's no doubt in my mind that we will have to reduce the supply of oil and gas and definitely call, but we're only going to do that by stop using it. Therefore, as a role for us to play in shaping new markets, new markets perhaps renewable power, which is, by the way, not the only solution. We also have to shape new markets for hydrogen, as Secretary Kerry said. We have to shape new markets for biofuels. Otherwise, we can't decarbonize long-distance shipping or aviation, etc. All together, these new markets for these new energy forms are a whole lot bigger than what electricity currently can address. But to just say, let's stop producing oil and gas, and then somehow the world will figure out how to go without it, I think it's not exactly the right way of dealing with the problem. I think the moment we say no more oil and gas from federal lands or the Gulf of Mexico, or from the US in general, it will just be imported. If you said no more combustion of hydrocarbons in cars, no more combustion of hydrocarbons in industrial processes, no home to be heated anymore with oil or gas, then we have a different discussion. But that's the discussion we need to have. We are only going to get to net zero if on a sector-by-sector basis, we have the right pathways and the right recipes to win that sector of using carbon-based energy. And that, I think, is the real challenge. And that challenge... Of course. Rebecca, can I comment? No. Look, Ben raises a very real question about sort of the realities of how you make these transitions. But the problem with gas is if we build out a huge infrastructure for gas now to continue to use it as the bridge fuel when we haven't really exhausted the other possibilities, we're going to be stuck with stranded assets in 10, 20, 30 years, whatever it's going to be. And gas is primarily methane. And we have a huge methane problem, folks. With the thawing of the permafrost and the thawing of the tundra, we have the capacity to go up in certain places and light a match, and you can see the water burning. The fact is that methane is 20 times more damaging than, if not more, than fossil fuel. So, I mean, the problem is, we have some other alternatives, and politics has turned against some of those possibilities. I'm speaking particularly about at least exploring. Everybody's going to scratch their head about where John Kerry is coming from on this one. But we ought to be exploring, as Bill Gates is, what the possibility is of fourth generation modular nuclear, because it is zero emissions. And if it pans out to be able to do what designers say it can do, which is not meltdown, not have proliferation challenges, not have waste challenges, then wow, maybe we have something if we don't, you know, locate them like a Fukushima right on the shoreline or at earthquake faults or et cetera. But we have the ability to perhaps manage that if we needed to in emergency. I'd rather do that. Sorry, go ahead. I need to call on Amina because she needs to go to another panel. Amina, how does this sound to you over the short term? And I know you're very concerned about the impact of the pandemic and the developing world, and the country is not being, you know, nearly as able to really make changes as they need to be. Well, we're very encouraged about what the commitments that are coming for the long term, but not encouraged by the short term commitments at all. I mean, I think when Ben talks about being blunt about this, I think he's absolutely right that we need, you can't be talking about new. If already the science tells you need to be decreasing that production by 6% per annum, and what we're seeing as an increase of 2%, that cannot be helpful. You do have, you know, control over certain perceptions on markets and fuel it. And so the signals coming from you and the plans for you to actually be on the right side of history are really important. But let me just quickly go to the finance piece. It doesn't matter what commitments we're making. And there are many commitments being made by every constituency. They're all at the table, maybe not enough. And when we get to Glasgow, Paris is going to find out whether, as we said, not necessarily the ambitions, but even Paris can be met, because we need so much more than that. But finance matters. And if we're not going to get the finance that is going to be invested in these just transitions, it's going to be incredibly difficult for us to live up to whatever commitment that we make. The 2030 timeline is important, because it is now that you want to respond to that green recovery. We're not in recovery mode. Everybody needs to be very clear about that. The vaccine is not there. Economies are shut down. And many of the countries that you've just spoken about will exacerbate the issues around many other developing countries. We know that the resources are there because trillions are being spent on stimulus packages in some of the developed world. But there's really not even the millions. So if we want to go from billions to trillions, we're not even at the million stage. I think there needs to be a really serious attempt to open up that space for the fiscal space that's needed for those investments to be made. And there needs to be a really robust discussion between the public sector and the private sector on how this is going to happen. What I really am enthusiastic about is that we're starting that now. We're not waiting for Glasgow. Alok has put in place concrete steps that we can all come in and join. And we're really looking forward to the roadmap that in fact the United States has put in place because it will bring people to the table. But we must come with scale, ambition, and the rubber is already hitting the road. And it's just about what you're going to do about that. How much of your rubber is going to hit the road? Because I think we're way past what we need to do. We're way past how much we need to do. It's the courage and the will to know that this is going to be painful because there's already been so much damage. And you cannot inflict more pain on those who are now trying to grow. But those that have caused that are not willing to put the investments in for all of us to come together. So I think with the UN, we continue to convene that space in developing countries and develop countries. And with the secretary general who says this is a year that is make or break. But like Secretary Kerry, I'm an optimist. And I think that there's enough around this table and many more tables to make that pivot to get to those ambitions and the scale that we need to make the impact. Thank you. Thank you, Amina. And Alok, I'd like to turn it to you. Will we be seeing more talk of the short term of 2030 rather than 2050 at Glasgow? Well, look, I mean, 2030 is absolutely vital on the pathway. If we're going to get to net zero by 2050, we actually have to be on the right pathway. And we had the climate ambition summit, which the UK co-organized with the UN. So big thanks to Amina and her team for all the support we got, and of course with France and our friends in Italy and Chile as well. And, you know, that was a moment in December, marking the five-year anniversary of Paris. We had 75 world leaders who came forward with concrete actions and commitments in tackling climate change. But we made some progress in 2020, but actually there is still a lot to do. And the hard miles are very much ahead of us. So absolutely, we do want countries to come forward with those ambitions and concrete plans up to 2030. I just want to pick up this point about public and private partnership, which I think is absolutely vital. And I think it's worth making this point that actually this transition to a green global economy, it really does present this historic economic business and investment opportunity. And I do think that the private sector is recognizing this. We're talking about renewables. I mean, let me give you an example from a UK perspective. I was the business secretary up until I took on this role full time. And one of the things that we have done over the past few years is significantly grow our offshore wind sector. It was pretty nascent a few years ago. I think the UK now has the largest offshore wind sector in the world. And the reason we were able to do this was because we also put in place mechanisms to provide support for investors. So we had a contract for a different scheme with a strike price. And it's meant that as a result of that, investors were able to come in. They were able to invest. They knew there was going to be a return. And actually, we've now got 10 gigawatts of offshore wind. The prime minister's announced that by 2030, we want 40 gigawatts to be able to power every single home in the UK from wind power, from renewables. And I think that, you know, John's talked about us, they've talked about hydrogen. Absolutely, that's something we are focusing on here. And I think very many countries around the world are focusing on that. But again, how do you provide those revenue mechanisms, the governments around the world providing those revenue mechanisms, which will then also allow the private sector to invest alongside us? Yes, governments can provide billions, but ultimately trillions are needed for us to really make proper headway. And that has to come from the private sector. And just a final point on this, I think we're talking about financial disclosures. I mean, absolutely, we've got trillions of dollars of assets, which are effectively now committed to this. From a UK perspective, our finance ministers announced that we will have mandatory disclosure by 2025 when it comes to TCFDs. I'd like to hear from other CEOs, and our time is rapidly approaching where we're going to need to wrap this up. FICA and Jesper, there's a sense that European business, quite frankly, is further ahead of US business. And FICA, you said something provocative to me earlier. You think in a sense it goes to the roots of shareholder views and really Jack Welch and kind of a short-termism that's existed in the US for some time. True. And if you follow this discussion and the remarks of Secretary Kerry and the remarks also of Ben about the reality of today, shows that there's different groups. It's not only the public and the private sector, but it's also science, investors, and consumers. Now, science is playing its role in influencing all of us by saying, we have an emergency here. Good. Consumers can play a role also. Like Ben is saying, if they have a wish to consume in a different way, automatically, they influence their businesses. So consumers have to play a role also. Investors can play also an important role. If they embrace, like Secretary Kerry was saying, TCFD, which my colleagues started and asked more transparency about the impact of climate on businesses, businesses will also change. Governments can play a role with policies. And I don't know how Secretary Kerry looks to carbon pricing, but the price on carbon has shown a very effective tool to influence the behavior of businesses as well. And businesses, of course, should take up a responsibility and can influence in itself. Governments, if businesses can show that they can still show economic growth, still provide jobs while screening. So the different groups can influence their different behaviors by their own actions and the statement of their own policies. And instead of that, we keep ourselves, we keep each other tight, it's better that the different groups, like consumers, can influence businesses. Business can influence governments. Governments influence businesses, which the tools I just described, then hopefully we can really, next to the narrative, make a concrete step forward. And just to wrap up here, Jasper, I'd love to hear from you and Ben and Secretary Kerry very, very quickly. What's your biggest priority for 2021? Well, to be brief, Rebecca, to start with, I think it's just a very good sign today that we agree on the why. And we also agree on that it's about actions going forward. So definitely from my side, from IKEA side, and as a representative of the WEF Climate Alliance, it's about getting to the table and discuss our topics to make sure we root out short termness and build economy 2.0. Ben, you were saying earlier that looking at what's happened, the shock of the pandemic that really needs to be a signal of what's in store if we're going to make dramatic change. Yeah, thanks, Rebecca. Indeed. The pandemic actually has shown how large the challenge really is. We had to completely disrupt the global economy to get a temporary dip of 7% in emissions. To just say, let's do that every year and compound it is obviously not going to be possible without radically doing everything different. Again, I will make this point again, it needs to have a sectorial approach because the solution for every sector is different. The whole idea that we can just put more renewables in and put a carbon price on is absolutely necessary, but it is totally inadequate because we're not going to get there without some very serious mandates, without some very serious changes in the way we are going to invest and to make business models work. The market is not going to make it happen. The market is an efficiency provider, but it cannot conjure up new business altogether. I think therefore, my focus is going to be for this other than of course making sure that our company continues to make progress as it does. My focus is to make sure that by COP26, the sectorial approach has come to life. Secretary Kerry, if you could quickly wrap us up, what is your biggest priority for 2021? My biggest priority is to take what Ben just said and help Fike and Ben together and put it into reality in Glasgow. I mean, Glasgow, I believe is the last best chance we have to try to summon the kind of response that Ben and Fike just talked about. And it will mean doing things very, very differently, but that's what it's going to take to get this done. It doesn't mean we can't get it done. And I agree. I mean, the market will do so much and we're going to have to have regulatory and also incentives put in place. And indeed, of course, it has to be sectorial because they're different. Agriculture is going to be different from what you do with industry. Industry's got a certain set of challenges, scale, aluminum, etc. But all of this really could be mapped out as we come together in Glasgow. And I think the world has high expectations of all of us. We've got to try to meet them. That's the goal for 2021. First of November, Glasgow, we have a chance to work over these next months, to massage it, pull it together. And let's make Glasgow what the world wants it to be, which is the roadmap to achieving what we need to achieve. Thank you, Secretary Kerry and to all of our panelists. It was a really provocative discussion and then you were blunt and I appreciate it. And I'm sure our listeners do as well. So thank you so much.