has been ranked the last out of nearly 200 countries for action taken to minimise global greenhouse gas emissions. The Sustainable Development Report 2021, which assessed progress towards the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, gave Australia a score of just 10 out of 100, placing the country at the bottom of the list of 193 UN member states. Here, the factors taken into account included policies for pricing carbon, fossil fuel emissions and emissions linked to the country’s imports and exports.
According to experts, it is no surprise that the Pacific nation scored so poorly, particularly owing to its economic reliance on natural resources such as coal.
“Australia has received similar rankings from other comparable studies, including the Climate Change Performance Index, which last year ranked Australia second last behind only Trump’s America,” Richie Merzian, a climate expert at the Australia Institute, said. “The federal government has no climate and energy policy and instead has cherry-picked technologies, many of which support the fossil fuel industry.”
Apart from contributions towards global climate efforts, the Sustainable Development Report tracked progress made by each country in reaching the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals, which include gender equality, wiping out poverty and hunger, quality education, affordable and clean energy, among others. Overall, Australia ranked 35th, particularly on account of the country’s strong performance in areas such as economic growth, education, health and wellbeing and clean water and sanitation. In terms of clean energy, although the Pacific nation has made moderate improvements over the past year, however, it was listed as having “major challenges” in this area as well.
