 who's shown to the world that yes, environment and development can coexist and under whose bold and decisive and very empathetic and compassionate leadership, ladies and gentlemen, India is all ready to lead the land management agenda at the global level. We thank Honourable Prime Minister for leading the talks here. We also welcome here on the days and really honoured to have the presence of the Honourable Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr. Ralph E. Gonzales. We extend greetings to him and thank him for joining us. Honoured to also have the Honourable Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, Excellency Ms. Amina Muhammad, greetings to her, Honourable Executive Secretary, United Nations Convention to combat the certification, Mr. Ibrahim Thio. The COP14 President, the Honourable Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and also the Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Government of India, Mr. Prakash Jav Rekhaji. The Honourable Minister of State, Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Government of India, Mr. Babu Supriya and respected Secretary-Environment, Government of India, Mr. Sike Mishra. And Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, also good greetings and a hearty welcome to all of you in this very important session, the high-level segment of COP14, as all of us come together. And in fact, if you see, this is the beginning of defining our resolve, our plan and action. Till the time we meet again, the next few years, with the next COP, as we work towards adopting the Delhi Declaration at the end of this segment. And as it is the beginning, let's mark its auspicious inauguration as for the Indian traditions and customs by seeking the blessings of the Supreme Power, the blessings of Lord Ganesha, Vignahartha, as we call him, and also the Lord of many happy new beginnings. So we begin with the Ganesh Mandana and we have the artists from the Bureau of Outreach Communication Song and Drama Division of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting helping us commune with the Almighty. We feel so much of energy in the air. Thank you to them. And may I now request the COP14 President, the Honorable Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Government of India, Shri Prakash Javrekarji, who as the Minister of Environment is championing India's environment strategy in all the three Rio Convention and thus linking land, climate and biodiversity to translate our Honorable Prime Minister's agenda of doubling the farmers' income by 2022 and India achieving its sustainable development goals and its indices. I request and invite the Honorable Minister for his welcome address. Good morning, our esteemed Honorable Prime Minister of the world's largest democracy and who has been re-elected with a massive mandate, Mr. Narendra Modiji, Prime Minister of St. Vincent Ralf-Gonsalvis, my Minister of State colleague Babu Supriya, Deputy Secretary General Amina Muhammad, UNCCD Executive Secretary Graham Chow, our Secretary of the Climate of the Environment Ministry, Mr. Sike Mishra, ministers here who have come from world over delegates, welcome you all in this beautiful city of Greater Noida which is part of India's largest state, Uttar Pradesh, and which is part of national capital region also. So you are in both cities of Delhi and Greater Noida and I welcome you all and now for last one week many delegates are here and I hope that everything is well and you must be enjoying the whole ambience of this conference. This UNCCD COP 14 is unique event. It's huge, more than 200 countries, 100 ministers and more than 8,000 participants. It's all time record for any COP and so this is the basis of very exciting discussions which we are going through and I'm very sure that you will definitely participate more in coming days. This logo of COP 14 is a beautifully designed, very meaningful and we crowdsourced it. A one young passionate environmentalist has come up with this unique design and therefore we have made it and you must have liked this. This shows the concern, why this is huge? This shows the concern of the world for environment. In Rio, all the three conventions UNFCCC, CBD and UNCCD came into existence and then we started a joint journey. The deliberations are rich and we'll come out with appropriate and ambitious Delhi declaration on the last day, that is tomorrow, which will ensure speedy restoration of degraded land for sustainable growth. UNFCCC, as I'm minister of climate change also, we were part of the Paris but that's a global problem and requires global action and global solutions and therefore there are nuances, there are hard negotiations and there are commitments which they go on commas and semicolumn also. But this CBD, biodiversity and UNCCD, combating desertification, have to be national goals and national action. So I saw more unity, learning from each other and sharing best practices. So that's a difference between these three climate conferences. India's prime minister's commitment to sustainable development for environment to protect fire elements, earth, sky or space, water, fire, air is full and complete. I've seen him in action for the last five years, his role in Paris, Sabit, was a leading role and when the penultimate day there was no solution in sight, he, all world leaders discussed and he played an important role to arrive at a amicable solution. He put before the world two different concepts of lifestyle and climate justice. He came out with India's ambitious program of 175 gigawatts of renewable energy which will be 40% of our energy capacity. So this is, was a huge step, world never believed but we are already on the track and we have created nearly half of our target of 175 gigawatt in renewable energies. That's huge. We have also, he has promoted solar alliance, those between Capricorn and Cancer, all the countries have been brought together and the solar alliance is working fine. We have this time, no country has done this, but we have levied a tax on coal production at the rate of six dollars. Many countries in the world say, oh it is impossible. I said in India it is not impossible, we have 36 parties in parliament and still this was unanimously done because our prime minister is a decisive leader and the money is so generated we are using for climate actions. We have promoted e-vehicles by offering various taxation conditions. We have also, he has now, in this say, Modi's government 2.0 which has started three months ago, has established a water resources ministry and this has to brought water, he has, as a, when you achieve minister, he has brought water of Narmada river to the past land of Kutcha and now that is land restored. It's an actual combating desertification and in desert it's not only dates. In Kutcha desert we are having mangoes and dragon fruit also successfully exported throughout the world. So this is how we are already on the track of combating desertification. Green cover is rising in India. We have 24 percent but in last five years we have increased by nearly 15,000 square kilometers and we are inching towards our target of having 33 percent cover. Last month he declared the results of tiger census and those tiger census which is the epitome of our ecology which is certification of your good ecology and that is now we have world's 77 percent of wild tigers, 2,967 that is the figure which he was welcomed by the world over. And last month also you must have seen many of you, he is on Discovery Channel, he is with Bear Grills the way he went into jungles, the dialogues and the, all the efforts where to reinforce his basic commitment to the environment cause of environment. Lastly I will only say that next two years India is the co-presidency and we will work with all of you. I can assure that we will if human actions have done damage to the world environment now positive human actions will make a difference and will give a better earth for the future generation. Thank you and welcome again. Thank you Honourable Minister Sir for highlighting the various initiatives which India is taking under the leadership of Honourable Prime Minister Modi towards ensuring a growth which is resource oriented environmentally sustainable and equitable taking care of our flora and fauna. And our next speaker ladies and gentlemen is a man of a vision and determination who has almost more than 40 years of extensive experience towards environmental governance and also the management of natural resources and sustainable development. In fact he advanced the recalibration of the United Nations integrated strategy for the Sahel as a special advisor to the Secretary General for Sahel. He also served as the assistant Secretary General and the Deputy Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Program where he was instrumental in shaping the organisation's strategic vision and the mandate. The personality and expression ladies and gentlemen is excellency Mr Ibrahim Thio the Executive Secretary of UNCCD whom I now request to kindly address this august gathering. He ladies and gentlemen is going to be speaking in French and English so you can use your headsets. Thank you. Excellency Monsieur le Premier ministre de la République d'Andre, Prime Minister of the Republic of India, Monsieur Numa de Modi. No country other than India would have been better placed to host this 14th conference of the parties. This conference is a pivotal one. Forward is taking place at the Silver Tribunal celebration to the United Nations Convention to Combat De-certification and it is also placed with a view to the 2050 horizon. India, this incredible country, is the junction between tradition arising from rich civilisations and modernity characterized by innovative technological progress, the information superhighways, the wonder of Bollywood, Bangalore or even the plans for intelligent cities in Chandigarh, Nagpur or Pondicherry. India is a country of diversity, a country with many facets, it is just as much a country of biodiversity as it is a country with arid lands, it is just as much a country of resilience as a country that refuses to accept the fate. India, the country with possible people, where the streets, people welcome you spontaneously with a smile on their face, their lips saying, it's a bad game. Excellency Dr. Rolf Gosales, Prime Minister of the same time, Saint and the Greeks, is Amin Mohamed by Secretary General of the United Nations, ministers, in particular the chair of the COP 13, U.S. L.A. C. Jean Villalon, minister of the China, distinguished heads of the agencies represented here this morning, particularly the administrative of the United Nations Development Program, the executive director of the United Nations Development Program, the executive director of the Global Environment Facility, the executive director of the Green Climate Fund, my dear colleague, executive secretary of the Convention of Biological Diversity, Mr. Ovae Sarmad, deputy executive secretary of the Convention on Climate. So Rene Casar Salasar, Assistant Director General of the FAO, dear colleagues from the United Nations, distinguished minister of the Environment, Forest and Climate Change of India, Mr. Prakash Javadekar, thank you for being here with your team and for being such a hospitable host. We have, through your hospitality, welcomed over 1,500 participants, never before has a COP for the UNCCD hosted as many delegates and world leaders. Ladies and gentlemen, I ask you kindly to join me in expressing our gratitude to the Republic of India. Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, the UNCCD staff in Bonn recently celebrated the arrival of the newest member of the secretariat's family. Our colleague Omer and his wife, Bashak, had just welcomed their newly-born deafness into the world. For sure, the two parents will do their utmost to ensure a bright future for deafness. Yet the future of a child is not in the hands of the parents alone but of humanity at large. This reminds me of Kofi Annan's novel lecture, where he reflected on the life I had for a young girl born in Afghanistan on that day. It wasn't a future any one of us would want for a child, a life centuries rather than miles, away from her peer group in wealthy nations. And nearly 20 years later, I am not sure the outlook has really changed. So given our 25-year anniversary theme of growing the future together, it made me wonder what can we achieve today to justify their confidence in us, to ensure that 25 years from now the children born today will see their families growing up in a safe, prosperous and equitable society. Where that young girl is a reminder of how far we have come, not how far we have to go. There is no escaping the powerful timing of this COP. On one hand, we have just had the IPCC report laying out the science of why the connections between land, climate and biodiversity can either threaten or threaten human well-being. On the other hand, we are just about to have the five UN summits in New York laying out options to get back on target for climate change and sustainable development goals. So the agreements we reach here about how to restore, protect and damage and manage our land on a massive scale and how to trigger a seismic shift in private sector partnerships to make it happen can immediately help ramp up the ambition of action plans for everyone involved. As land is one of the biggest carbon sinks available, we must use this window of opportunity to make more stakeholders realize that even beyond a financial return of as much as 30 to 1 for restoration or social returns for millions of jobs in energy, technology, tourism or agriculture, any investment in land creates a whole range of spillover benefits to fuel that cycle. For example, restoring 350 million hectares of degraded land by 2030 could generate up to $9 trillion in ecosystem services and sequester up to 26 gigatons of greenhouse gases. Nice numbers, but what do they actually mean for people around the world? For herders on the rangelands of Jordan and Egypt, they mean reinstating traditional land management that stabilizes incomes and reduces conflicts. For tea growers in Vietnam, China, India and Sri Lanka, they mean using natural fertilization and pest control to transform their plantations from red stumps to robust yields. For rice farmers in Madagascar, they mean swapping slash and burn monoculture for a basket of techniques that could see their crops diversify and grow by 40%. And for ranchers, ranchers in the tropical Andes, they mean using pasture rotation, biogas and water systems to improve the health of the meadows, the biodiversity and the cattle even doubling their milk production. What's more, all these projects have three things in common. First, women are equally involved in the decisions, implementation and benefits, whether that through greater financial security, stronger land rights, new skills or simply not having to work for hours to get water. Second, those examples are all projects of the global environmental facility that are being delivered through partnerships with governments, engineers, scientists, local communities and our sister agencies across the United Nations. And third, leveraging that inclusive and collaborative approach with the both the rich and the pace of change scaled up dramatically, especially if you can align them with some of the ambitious cooperation programs already taking root such as the Initiative 2020 in Latin America and the Caribbean, the Great Green Wall of Africa or the Green Bells of China and India, to name just a few. Ladies and gentlemen, combining our land with those three little concepts of equality, types and scale could take us a very long way towards our common goals. Just a year into this century, Kofi Annan's remarks acknowledged that we were already violently disabused of any hopes that progress towards global peace and prosperity is inevitable. When he asked us to confront it, we nodded, applauded and carried on as before. So by the time that young girl, he spoke of rich her teams, we had degraded over a fifth of our land, putting climate change and poverty on a fast track with inequality every minute in the world. I know that each one of you feels the same about someone somewhere, that we all want to see them growing together in a world where every child has an equal chance and that every investment in land will unlock opportunities to bring that world closer to reality, which is why I also know we will ensure this COP makes global peace and prosperity more achievable if not yet inevitable. Perhaps making it inevitable can be our challenge for next time. Bahut Denavad. Thank you very much. Thank you, sir, for your message and also reminding us that each one of us have a greater responsibility for someone somewhere and towards creating a planet in a growth which is more equitable and sustainable. Thank you so very much. And now, ladies and gentlemen, it's in my honor to request our next speaker who earlier as the environment minister of Nigeria has played a very important role towards Nididia's efforts on climate action and on sustainable development. Prior to this, she's also been the special advisor to the dense secretary general of United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, on the post-2015 development agenda and she has been instrumental in bringing in the 2030 agenda for sustainable development and the sustainable development goals. Presently, ladies and gentlemen, she is in the most co-weighted position of the deputy secretary general of United Nations. It's my pleasure to be inviting and requesting our Excellency Ms. Amina J. Mohamed to kindly address the soccer scattering. Your Excellency, Prime Minister Nindra Modi, Your Excellency, Prime Minister Ranth, Ralph Gonzalez, Excellencies, colleagues, friends, ladies and gentlemen, and special recognition to the young people who will be watching or who are in the audience. My deep appreciation to the Government of India for hosting this conference and in particular to Prime Minister Modi for his vision and his leadership. To the Executive Secretary, my brother Ibrahim Tio, for the opportunity to highlight the unprecedented expectations on your work here. These times are not normal and they are critical and we need to start a massive effort to take the solutions that we're discussing here today to scale, to move beyond the negotiation and the planning to action and impact individually and collectively at the country level. We've already used a third of our time frame to deliver on the 2030 agenda and we've just two weeks to galvanize the urgent action ahead of the summits in New York. And we have the three inextricably linked Rio conventions on land biodiversity and climate, which were created to trigger that action but are still not reaching their full potential. The latest scientific data shows that the massive effort is painfully overdue. A quarter of our greenhouse gases, gas emissions come from land degradation, a million species face extinction, threatening ecosystems that provide everything that we eat, we drink and we breathe. And the lives of half, half of our people on this planet, are affected by desfication, land degradation and drought. What's worth is that the unhealthier our land becomes, the more dangerous the implications will be for all of us. So we can't really afford to ignore that the loss of land and ecosystem services shrinks GDP by 10% a year, nor can we ignore the increases of the likelihood of violent conflict or forced migration that affects mostly our women and our children. And those risks with millions of people already feeling the effect are spreading across the planet. From the dip in Germany's industrial output because drought hit the Rhine shipping last year to the soil loss costing the United States up to 44 billion every year, from the forest fires of the Arctic or the Amazon to the sandstorms and the droughts in the Middle East or the Sahel, and from the small island states and coastal communities that are fraying around the edges, to the Himalayan communities where women and girls spend more time collecting firewood than they did when this convention was born. Right across the planet, when the land suffers, so too do the people. Yet if we act with a sense of urgency and ambition, that the same land holds a credible number of solutions that we're all looking for. Solutions that will let people thrive, not just survive. And I believe everyone in this room and beyond is committed to that. To my mind, we can do three things to step up the ambition, speeds, and results of our action. First, let's try to move out of our silos, our individuality. Let's constrain us and our ambition. Corporation and action that delivers multiple benefits must be a priority for all of us. For example, we know that 820 million people are still going hungry and that crop yields are dropping as demand for food is set to increase by 50% in the coming decades. Restoring 150 million hectolands of farmland could feed 200 million more people every year. At the same time, it would provide greater resilience and over 30 billion a year in increased income for small stakeholders and sink an additional two gigatons of carbon dioxide a year. Second, let's deploy and invest our resources wisely. A few days ago, the UN Global Compact and the Italian energy company, Enel, announced the first general-purpose bond linked to the SDGs. It raised $1.5 billion. That means it was three times oversubscribed. It certainly signals a strong demand and we should encourage more companies to follow suit. It is all great news until you realize that land degradation is costing us trillions of dollars every year and adding to the very emission problem the bond is trying to solve. We must make the investments in this land degradation, particularly in our low-income countries, to stop the preventable losses. If we restore the land, we put our investments into nature-based solutions that we know will work that deliver for UNCCD, but also for the nationally-determined contributions under the UNFCCC and let nature and biodiversity flourish. The third, build more innovative partnerships to scale up the impact of individual and collective action. Look at the T-grows the executive secretary just mentioned. They are expanding restoration techniques. In India, over half a million T-workers are working with Trastea to transform their farms and their futures. In turn, Trastea is working with the GF, UN Environment, and the rainforests and irons to scale up impact across four countries and improve consumer choices around the world. While land restoration and new increased yields are contributing to national commitments on poverty, biodiversity, and climate change, it's exactly the kind of homegrown, joined-up thinking that has allowed our host country to be one of the world's fastest-growing economies and still slash poverty by over 40%. It's a very concrete demonstration of why, if you act, you don't have to choose between social, economic, and environmental progress. In each of our communities and each of our countries, we can and we must have all of them in an integrated response to the challenges that we face today. And that's why I'm delighted that this COP is urging each party and each stakeholder to take bolder action on a much bigger scale. But it also aligns so closely with those three drivers to break down the silos, to invest wisely in sustainable management of resources and land restoration, and is building up the partnerships that will accelerate the urgency of the change that we need. Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, we no longer have the luxury of spending the next 10 years debating the targets. We have two weeks to move our common agenda in the right direction to bend the curve on a planet of less than two degrees towards action and impact. We can start with one opportunity, one child, Daphne, one woman, one man, one tea farmer, one business, one land restoration project. Then we scale it up, speed it up, join it up. It is in these critical times that this, our individual, and collective responsibilities will be needed now, even more than they ever have been. It's a massive effort, but together we can lift and achieve the aspirations of the climate agenda. I thank you. Thank you, ma'am, for your message and giving a clarion call to everyone that it is time to actually convert ideas into action and intent into impact, and even small steps are going to be making a huge difference. We need to come together, collaborate, and build partnerships. And now, ladies and gentlemen, inviting another world leader, the Honorable Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, who's been the Prime Minister for more than 18 years, and he stands extremely passionate about realization of the Sustainable Development Goals and also the Global Environmental Governance. He, ladies and gentlemen, is also an authority on the politics of climate change. I request Excellency Dr. Ralphie Gonzalez, the Honorable Prime Minister of St. Vincent and Grenadines to address this August gathering. Madam Chairperson, my dear friend, the distinguished Prime Minister of India, the sister Amina from the United Nations, our brother Ibrahim from the UNCCD, our Minister of the Environment and Climate Change from India, other distinguished ladies and gentlemen, I first of all would like to say how happy I am to be here in India. I also want to indicate, just in case you think that someone who is Prime Minister for 19 years runs some dictatorship, that we have elections every five years and I've just been winning them. I want also to see if I can add some value to what has been said already. And accordingly, I want to adopt and call my own the speeches which have all been made here this morning. Very informative, very interesting and very forward-looking speeches. And since I adopt all the speeches and call them my own, I should simply sit down, but I've come all the way from the Caribbean so you expect me to say something a little more. Desertification has been authoritatively identified as the greatest environmental challenge of our time and climate change is making it far worse. Both climatic variations and human activities have caused engendered or facilitated land degradation in arid, semi-arid and dry subhumid areas which in turn have resulted in extraordinary misery, human suffering and extreme poverty. The veritable two horsemen of the apocalypse, land degradation and climate change, undoubtedly pose an existential threat to humanity, civilized life and living. The science in these respects definitively and unanswerably details the contours and more of this existential threat and its potentially dire consequences. Yet, the collective responses of nation states globally have not measured up adequately or sufficiently to the enormous tasks at hand so as to obviate disaster. Accordingly, this conference of parties, COP 14, convened under the Aegis of the United Nations Convention to combat desertification, is a seminal stage in post in humanity's quest for a better and sustainable condition of our lives, living and production. I want to thank the executive secretary of UNCDD, my friend Ibrahim, for inviting me here and who is doing a fantastic job and we owe him a tremendous debt of gratitude. India, glorious India, the home of a magnificent civilization of nobility, legitimacy and authenticity, which strives for a better world for all humanity and which now hosts this gathering of the convention's participants, provides the context, the backdrop and wise leadership to frame COP 14 as path-breaking, as epoch-making, in the arresting of land degradation, the sequestration of carbon, the rollback of global warming and the slowdown and reversal of the ravages of anthropogenic climate change, in accord with at least the internationally agreed goals and targets. If we have come to India just to do the usual talking, I think we would have been not making the best use of our time. We heard the tremendous work which has been done in India by the government of Prime Minister Modi in relation to the issues and the consideration at this conference that we, each of us, individually and collectively, must resolve ahead of hunger and all the assessments which we take in place. We must resolve to make this COP 14 path-breaking and epoch-making. Each of us, we must reflect and come to that conclusion. And even if you have governments and organizations which are not as enthused as you may be, please be patient and be calm with them, but nevertheless prod them with urgency because these times are perilous. The presence of our dear friend, the distinguished Prime Minister Modi, fortifies our hope that our future will not be desecrated, that our present will not become enveloped in a debilitating learned helplessness, inertia, and stasis. It is remarkable that India, the largest democracy in the world, works hand-in-hand with St. Vincent and the Grenadines, which is one of the smallest democracies in the world and where some countries are inclined towards nativism and unilateralism, India reaches out. And in addition to what it is doing internally, it is making an important difference globally. And I want to thank Prime Minister Modi for his remarkable work in both respects. I just want to say this, parenthetically, you're probably aware that St. Vincent and the Grenadines has become the smallest country ever to win the right at the General Assembly to sit on the Security Council, the United Nations. And I want to thank the Prime Minister for the tremendous support that India gave to our campaign and we will begin sitting from January 1st next year until the end of 2021. And we intend to use our position on the Security Council to address the security consequences of climate change and land degradation. The trilogy of international conventions are focusing respectively on biodiversity, land degradation, and climate change. What always to be viewed as an integrated whole since age is inextricably connected with the others and since we want to make this conference epoch-making and path-breaking, we have to be truthful and honest. We have to accept that much of the international community is too often considered UNCCD, despite its seminal importance, as a kind of proverbial and wanted offspring without legitimate paternity and undeserving of proper maintenance. You know, when we have, when we create our children, when we make them, the old distinction as to whether you're born in wedlock and out of wedlock no longer exists, but we have created UNCCD and we don't quite treat it as legitimate and we don't quite help it to be properly maintained so that it can survive and develop and carry out its mandate. We don't do that to our children. I don't think we should do that to the UNCCD. But despite the fact that the UNCCD has been treated in less than a wholesome manner, the truth is that land and its protection from rapacious degradation constitute the core upon which rests the life-sustaining pillars of water, food, forests, shelter, clothing and energy so that let us bring UNCCD to the center stage. It is not a sideshow. It is the fulcrum of humanity's main event. The recent global controversy regarding the veritable fires of Babylon in the Amazon is a poignant remember of the importance of our land and our forests. So land and its bewildering complexities go hand in hand with biodiversity and climate change. Thus more than ever, the voices of the international community must ring out loud with the necessity and desirability of land degradation neutrality, its targets and measures. We have accepted these. Enrapting all this are the vital issues touching on concerning poverty, infrastructure development, bushfires, deforestation, unsustainable agricultural practices, coastal erosion, pollution, natural disasters, the efficacious application of science and technology, capacity building and education, and the robust legislative and regulatory framework. All of these things demand substantial resource allocations. Look, they're not going to come from countries which can barely feed their populations. The resources have to come from countries which have the more developed economies, which have a history of relationship with poorer countries. And the resources, if we are serious with what we agreed upon, the 17 sustainable development goals adopted in September 2015 at the General Assembly of the United Nations, it is agreed that we must have a partnership. And if we're going to have a partnership, we can't seriously expect that those who for a variety of historical reasons are impoverished, that they're the ones who must bear the greater burden when, in fact, they have already suffered through colonialism, through imperialism. People would like to hear these words, but we have to be honest and truthful with one another if we're going to have not a confrontation, but a conversation as to what is necessary and desirable. So we need substantial resources. We don't want to hear the pledges when those who make the pledges do not really mean them. And it's a case of taking the fool a little further by having us believe that those pledges are real when they are in fact a mirage. This is one earth that we have. Look, what happens in North Africa affects migration and security issues in Europe. It is in everybody's interests that these matters be efficaciously addressed. There is nowhere else for us to hide. Of course, in this partnership, it is also a responsibility in the less developed countries to mainstream land and land development into the overall development, sustainable development processes so that we don't get a free pass. We have our own obligations and our own responsibilities. It is an often mistakenly held belief for a serious misconception that the UNCCD has little or nothing to do with small island developing states because deserts are the province of continental Africa and Asia, but not of the islands, for example, in the Caribbean and the Pacific. The truth is, is that land degradation and drought affect all unsung places. We have heard the examples given by Amina. We have heard them by Ibrahim. We have heard from the India, the minister, the distinguished minister from India. Look, Haiti is part of a Caribbean island. And it is a proverbial poster child for historical land degradation, which has led to much impoverishment of an extraordinary nation. The land of the heroic black Jacobins. But you know, many persons say that Haiti, they're responsible for all what is happening there themselves. But when you take into account that when the Haitian Revolution established the state of Haiti, defeated colonialism, slaves, the first successful slave rebellion in history, the departing colonial power, France, subsequently imposed reparations for the from the very slaves, the ex-slaves, for the having freed themselves. And they had to make those payments for over 100 years. Those are realities. And when you see Haiti, we have to make sure that the international agencies, the developed countries, and especially those who have a historic responsibility in relation to Haiti, seek to explore a genuine partnership for the correction of historic wrongs and for assisting us in developing a better future. Additional to the host of factors, natural and man-made, which have historically degraded land in the Caribbean islands, there is currently the challenge of the annual appearance in our seas and on our beaches of the Sargasson seaweed, which threatens to spoil our lands and suffocate our tourism. This threat demands the urgent attention of UNCDD and its secretariat. This matter has to be put at the international level, the issue of the Sargasson seaweed. Much of the land degradation in small island developing states is directly related to and caused by climate change. And we know the issues, global warming, the rise of the level of the sea, the battering of the coastal areas, the damage to our rivers, and their banks, landslides, and deforestation who renders hurricanes and storms of increasing frequency and ferocity. They're all connected with climate change, to which our sids contribute little or nothing. In domestic law, if you have a nuisance which comes from your land onto my land, and it could be a nuisance by noise, by water, it could be any fact which constitutes a nuisance in law, you have to pay for the loss and damage which I suffer. In this world, the situation is really cock-eyed. We don't contribute anything of any significance at all to climate change. You do all what you want to do. I'm talking about developed economies, cause damage to us, and then all you want to do is to provide. Sops, I am advising, not in any confrontational manner. All of us have to work together at this. Otherwise, we are going to come to grief. We have seen it happen before, and it could happen on a much larger scale. We must not allow the short-sighted leaders of powerful countries not to recognize the truth of what I'm speaking here today in New Delhi. Two years ago, hurricanes and storms lashed Dominica and Barbuda. Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands in Martins and Anguilla. This year, there is a destruction and tremendous loss of lives on two islands in the archipelagic state of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas. Immediate support is required urgently to the people of the Bahamas for relief, recovery, and reconstruction. I want this message to ring out loudly at COP 14. A lot of people are dead, and these two islands have to start from scratch. We in Karkoma actively in solidarity with the Bahamas. But without substantial extra regional support, the people of the Bahamas are going to take a long, long time to recover. Islands cannot truly survive if global warming exceeds 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. And we are on course for much more than that. These are perilous times. A succession of leaders of religion, politics, science business, and public administration have wisely advised over the recent decades, particularly since the resummit of 1992, that the unsustainable extraction of resources from our lands and seas by a rapacious economic system hell bent on private accumulation and profit without regard for humanity as a whole cannot continue. Yet the international community seems relatively powerless to contain this unwholesome and unsustainable extraction of resources. Look, we've got to be serious. We just can't take the prior statements anymore. Meaningful corrective action is required. You know it, and I know it. For humanity is survival and sustainable development. I don't believe for one minute when I hear people tell me that they saw that leader of a big country, or they saw that big country, that they don't understand the science of climate change. I don't believe it for one moment. They know the science. But they're thinking that if they have another 20 or 30 years, for instance, of fossil fuel, they can strengthen and deepen their hegemony over the world. I don't want you to give anybody a pass to tell them that they don't understand, because it's so simple to understand. It is their interests, their economic interests, which runs counter to their internalizing and understanding of the basic science in this matter. Today, our world faces a bundle of interlocking challenges to be urgently and satisfactorily addressed. Climate change, land degradation, and the consequences. Scarcity of vital resources such as water, energy, and strategic minerals. The growing inequality in the distribution of the Earth's resources. The constant threats to world peace and security. The advances in artificial intelligence and the socioeconomic impact. The aging of the world's population. The organization of the global economic system. The governance arrangements in individual nation states. The growing threat of nativism and unilateralism. And the ongoing quest among right-thinking persons for unnecessary and desirable multilateralism. That's why we are here. The issues before us today, I reiterate, have assumed unusual and unprecedented seriousness. And they are just, they are thus urgent. They are existential to our lives, our living and production. And despite the awesome nature of the challenges, we cannot afford to be pessimistic. There is no way to go. We are on Earth. These are not time salamentations. Therefore, optimism, clear thinking, and concerted action. And I say all the factors have come together to help us to have such a distinguished leader as Prime Minister Modi to help us in leading discharge. I thank you. Thank you, sir, for your very passionate and empathetic message and a message that we all own the responsibility and need to walk the talk in all sincerity and honesty. And now, ladies and gentlemen, I take the distinct honor of requesting our Prime Minister, the Honorable Prime Minister of India, Shri Narendra Modiji, to kindly address this August gathering. A man with a vision and a man on a mission towards creating a beautiful, sustainable planet. Friend, Prime Minister, Rav Gonsalvesh, Srimati Aminaji, Ibrahim Chiyaw, my minister colleague, Prakash Javdekar, Babun Supriya, Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, I welcome you all to India for the 14th session of the Conference of Parties to the United Nations Convention to Combat Dejectification. I thank the Executive Secretary, Mr. Ibrahim Chiyaw, for having brought this convention to India. The record registration of this program reflects the global commitment to the task of reversing land degradation. India also looks forward to making an effective contribution as we take over the co-presidency for a two-year term. Friends, for age each, be in India always given importance to land. In Indian culture, the earth is held as sacred and treated as a mother. While getting up in the morning, when we touch the earth with our feet, we seek forgiveness of Mother Earth by praying, Samudra Vasane Devi, Parvatastana Mandale, Vishnupati Namastubhyam, Badas per Samshamaswami. Friends, climate and environment impact both biodiversity and land. It is widely accepted that the world is facing the negative impact of climate change. This is seen in a loss of land and plants and animal species facing the states of becoming eccentric. Climate change is also leading to land degradation of various kinds. Be it due to rising sea levels and wave action, erratic rainfall and storms, and sandstorms caused by hot temperatures. Ladies and gentlemen, India has hosted global gathering through the COP for all the three conventions. There is this reflex, our commitment to addressing all the three main concerns of the Rio Convention. Going forward, India would be happy to propose initiatives for greater South-South cooperation in addressing issue of climate change. Biodiversity, land degradation. Friends, you will be shocked to know that day-jetification affects over two-thirds of the countries of the world. This makes a compelling case for action on landfront. Combine this with the water crisis facing the world, because when we address degraded lands, we also address water scarcity. Augmented water supply, enhancing water recharge, slowing down water runoff, and retaining moisture in the soil are all parts of a holistic land and water strategy. I call upon the leadership of UNCCD to create a global water action agenda, which is central to the land degradation neutrality strategy. Friends, restoring the health of land is critical for sustainable development. Today, I reminded of India's NDCS. That was submitted at the Paris COP, at the UNFCCC. It highlighted India's deep cultural roots of maintaining a healthy balance between land, water, air, trees, and all living beings. Friends, it would make you happy that India has been able to increase its tree cover. Between 2015 to 2017, India's tree and forest cover has been increased by 0.8 million hectares. In India, any divergent of forest land for development purposes has to be compensated by making an equivalent land mass available for a forestry. It is also required a monetary payment of the value of timber which such forest land would have yield. I'm happy to share that only last week funds amounting to nearly $6 billion, means 40 to 50,000 crore rupees, have been released to the provincial governments in view of such diversion for development of forest lands. My government had launched a program to double the income of farmers by increasing crop yield through various measures. This includes land restoration and micro-irrigation. We are working with the motto of per drop more crop. At the same time, we are also focusing on zero budget natural farming. We have also introduced a scheme to determine the soil quality of each of the farms and are issuing soil health cards to farmers. This enables them to grow right type of crops, fertilizers, and use the right quantity of water. So far, about 217 million soil health cards have been distributed. We are increasing the use of bio-fotilizers and reducing the use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers. Water management is another important issue addressed LDN. We have created Jal Shakti Ministry to address all water-related important issue in totality. Recognizing the value of water in all farms, we enforce zero liquid discharge in many industrial processes. The regulatory regime provides for treatment of wastewater to a degree that it can be put back into the river system without harming life in water. Friends, I would like to draw your attention to another form of land degradation, which if not prevented would be impossible to reverse. This is the manis of plastic waste. Apart from having adverse health implications, this is going to render lands unproductive and unfit for agriculture. My government has announced that India will put an end to single-use plastic in the coming years. We are committed to development of environment friendly substitutes and also an efficient plastic collection and disposal method. I believe the time has come for even the world to say goodbye to single-use plastic. Friends, human empowerment is closely linked to the state of the environment. Be it harnessing water resources or reducing usage of single-use plastic, the way ahead is behavioral change. It is only when all sections of society decide to achieve something we can see the desired results. We may introduce any number of frameworks, but real change will be powered by teamwork on the ground. India saw this in the case of the Swachh Bharat mission. People from all walks of life took part and ensured sanitation coverage was up from 38% in 2014 to 99% today. I am seeing the same spirit when it comes to ensuring the end of single-use plastic. Youngsters in particular are most supportive and are taking the lead to bring positive change. The media is also playing a very valuable role. Friends, I would like to make further commitment to the Global Land Agenda. I also offer India support to those countries who may like to understand and adopt some of the LDN strategies that have succeeded in India. From this forum, I would like to announce that India would raise its ambition of the total area that would be restored from its land degradation status from 21 million hectares to 26 million hectares between now and 2030. This will support India's large commitment to achieve an additional carbon sink between 2.5 billion metric tons to 3 billion metric tons through tree cover. Be in India, take pride in using remote sensing and space technology for multiple applications, including land restoration. India would be happy to help other friendly countries develop land restoration strategies through cost-effective satellite and space technology. In order to further develop a scientific approach and facilitate introduction of technology to land degradation issues, we have decided to set up a Center for Excellence in India at the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education. This agency will actively engage to promote South-South cooperation with those who may wish to access knowledge, technology, and training of manpower to address land degradation related issues. Friends, I understand that an ambition's new Delhi declaration is being considered. We are all aware that the sustainable development goals have to be achieved by 2030, of which attainment of islanding is also a part. I wish you well as you deliberate further towards proposing a global strategy for land degradation neutrality. I would end by saying a very popular pair from one of our olden scriptures, Om Dayoho, Shantihi, Antariksham Shantihi. The word shanti does not only refer to peace or the antidote to violence. Here it refers to prospering. Everything has a law of being, a purpose, and everybody has to fulfill that purpose. The fulfillment of that purpose is prosperity. Om Dayoho Shantihi. Antariksham Shantihi. So it says, may the skies, heaven, and space prosper. Pruthvi Shantihi, Apah Shantihi, Aushadaya Shantihi, Manaspathaya Shantihi, Visvedeva Shantihi, Brahm Shantihi. May Mother Earth prosper. This includes the flora and fauna with whom we share our planet. May they prosper. May every drop of water prosper. May the divine gods prosper. Sharava Shantihi, Shantireva Shantihi, Sama Shantirevahi, may everybody prosper. May I also be placed with prosperity. Om Shantihi, Shantihi, Shantihi. Om Prosperity, Prosperity is Prosperity. The thought and philosophy of our ancestors was all embracing and filled with a great thought. They realized the true relationship between me and we. They knew that prosperity of me can only be through prosperity of we. Whenever ancestors said, we, they did not just mean their family or community or even just humans. It includes the sky, water, plants, trees, everything. It is also very important to know the order in which they are praying for peace and prosperity. They pray for the sky, the earth, the water, the plants. These are things that sustain us. This is what we call the environment. If this prosper, then I prosper. This was their mantra. Even today, this is an extremely relevant thought. With this period, I once again congratulate you for taking part in this summit. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, Honorable Prime Minister, sir, for your very beautiful thoughts and message wishing the prosperity of all individuals, of all life on earth. Thank you, Honorable Prime Minister, for guiding us. Thank you very much for your very inspiring and motivating message. Ladies and gentlemen, once again thank the Honorable Prime Minister for, in fact, dignifying and magnifying this event with his gracious presence and his message. Thank you once again to all the distinguished dignitaries here on the days. With that, ladies and gentlemen, we close this high-level segment of COP 14. And we hope that a powerful, informative, and thought provoking address by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the plenary session and opening ceremony of this high-level segment of COP 14 of the UNCCD now comes to a close. The Prime Minister interacting with everyone on the dears with great warmth and affection. With these images, we now take your leave and wish you a wonderful day ahead.