Alastair Marsh believes the USA\u2019s withdrawal from the Paris Agreement is a reminder that populous, industrialising countries deserve more attention.<\/em><\/p>\n To twist a common saying, there\u2019s no USA in team. The USA has withdrawn from the Paris Agreement \u2013 an accord between nearly all the world\u2019s countries to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to limit the rise in global temperature to less than 2\u00b0C above pre-industrial levels.<\/p>\n To gauge the impact and appropriate response to this, let\u2019s remind ourselves of the nuts and bolts of the Agreement. Each country has voluntarily pledged to reduce its GHG emissions over the coming years by a chosen amount \u2013 this is known in UN parlance as \u2018nationally determined contributions\u2019 (NDCs). Countries will report on progress every two years, but as it\u2019s voluntary there\u2019s no penalty if targets are missed. Another part is that developed countries (private sector contributions allowed) are expected to provide resources \u2013 for example, to the UN Green Climate Fund \u2013 to assist less developed countries in both mitigating and adapting to climate change. The goal is to annually raise and distribute US$100bln by 2020, alongside technological and other assistance.<\/p>\n The White House press release referenced these aspects in its arguments for withdrawal, claiming that the required emission reductions would necessitate cuts in certain industries and cost millions of jobs, that it\u2019s unfair for the USA to contribute to the UN Green Climate Fund with no return and that the globally pledged emissions cuts wouldn\u2019t impact climate change anyway. I believe that although this is big, bad news, there is good reason to be positive if we turn our focus to populous, industrialising countries...<\/p>\n