He said that although the event was being held in Spain, it is being presided over by Chile. "This is Chile's COP: it is Chile that has organized the leadership and that has worked for an alliance against climate change and the success of this event will belong to Chile."

TIME FOR ACTION

The major task for the delegates is to discuss Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, the measures to promote voluntary international cooperation by paying a price on carbon, emission trading schemes and other market mechanisms.

The conference comes as global efforts to mitigate climate change are on the brink of failure.

"The global contributions to climate change fall far short," said Berthold Kuhn, an expert on sustainable development with the Free University of Berlin and senior advisor to the Dialogue of Civilizations Research Institute.

According to a UN Environment Programme report on the emissions gap published last week, countries have collectively failed to stop the growth in global greenhouse gas emissions, meaning that deeper and faster cuts are now required.

The report says that emissions have gone up by 1.5 percent per year in the last decade. In 2018, emissions totaled 55 gigatonnes of CO2 equivalent. This is putting the Earth on course to experience a temperature rise of 3.2 degrees Celsius by the end of this century, rather than the 1.5 degree goal set in the Paris Agreement.

This critical situation has prompted the conference, which will last till Dec. 13, to choose "Time for Action" as its motto.

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