This crucial climate summit is the 26th session of conference of Parties (COP26) to the UNFCCC and it was scheduled from 9-19 November 2020 in Glasgow, UK. It has been postponed due to the health emergency the world is currently facing in tackling the COVID-19.  

A statement from the UN Climate Change press release on this Wednesday, the 1 st April, 2020, it confirmed that COP26 would be delayed until next year and new dates for the conference would be decided in due course.

As the virus has spread around the world, where today there is over 1,000,000 Coronavirus cases. This pandemic has imposed the governments to give the priority to tackle its outbreak. This can be clearly seen in Glasgow’s Scottish Events Campus (SEC Arena) which was due to host the talks (COP 26), where it is now set to become a temporary hospital to house patients affected by COVID-19.

The UK energy minister and president of the COP26 conference, Alok Sharma, said that “The world is currently facing an unprecedented global challenge and countries are rightly focusing their efforts on saving lives and fighting the COVID-19. That is why we have decided to reschedule COP26”

The UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Patricia Espinosa emphasized that: “COVID-19 is the most urgent threat facing humanity today, but we cannot forget that climate change is the biggest threat facing humanity over the long term.

Even though, this conference was delayed until next year because of the coronavirus pandemic, the green campaigners and climate leaders have encouraged the governments around the world to make new commitments on the climate crisis.

From the views of different green campaigners; this pandemic shows that there are huge lessons to be learned about the importance of listening to science and the need for urgent collective global action.