MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Mercosur agrees on a negotiating group to deal with climate change

Mercosur encompasses “food-producing countries that are on the way to environmental responsibility,” according to Uruguay's Peña

Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay Friday have announced in Glasgow that they had agreed on the need to create a negotiating group to tackle climate change.

Ministers of the four full Mercosur members attending Glasgow's COP26 Climate Change Summit insisted on the relevance of agriculture for global food security and that measures need to be taken in that regard to adjust to the pursuit of the 2015 Paris Agreement goals.

Environment Ministers of Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay met for the first time at the Scottish capital and agreed to join forces to face climate change from a joint perspective.

The officials highlighted the role of science, the importance of agricultural production to obtain food security and the crucial role of ecosystems for the sustainable development of the four countries.

Uruguay's Nelson Adrián Peña Robaina said that “we agreed to start working together on environmental issues through cooperation actions and in this way to position ourselves as food-producing countries that are on the way to environmental responsibility in their production systems, to facilitate access of our products to the markets, it seems clear and logical that those countries that have the same interests and similar difficulties join together in the search for common objectives.”

Peña also announced a future meeting to take place in Paraguay to fine-tune the details of this agreement and generate a work schedule for the future.

The ministers highlighted the enormous potential that this group has in the region to jointly face the challenges of climate change and thus access better financial solutions to implement climate action.

In addition to the Uruguayan Minister of the Environment, Adrián Peña and the Uruguayan delegation, the Minister of Environment and Sustainable Development of Argentina, Juan Cabandié, were present at the meeting together with his delegations; the Brazilian environment minister, Joaquim Álvaro Pereira Leite; and the Minister of the Environment of Paraguay, César Oviedo.