CAIRO, Dec. 1 (Aswat Masriya) – Egypt’s cabinet passed on Wednesday the Paris Agreement for climate change which still needs parliamentary review to be entered into force.

"This step [the cabinet's ratification] is considered an important milestone," senior advisor to the Ministry of Environment Hussein Abaza told Aswat Masriya.

The agreement which was initiated in December 2015 urges UN member states "the global response to the threat of climate change" by keeping rise of temperature well below 2 degrees Celsius this century. The agreement also underlines responsibility sharing from developed to developing countries in terms of providing needed funding, technology transfer, as well as capacity building.

Egypt was among the few countries who have not ratified the agreement since its issuance in Paris last year, though it is regarded as one of the most vulnerable countries to the impacts of climate change.

Minister of Environment Khaled Fahmy said in a press interview on the sidelines of the COP22, the Climate Change Conference held in Morocco in mid-November, that the ratification process is lengthy given that the parliament is currently busy reviewing a plethora of bills. 

However, in order to fully utilise the benefits of the agreement, Egypt needs to begin with modifying its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) to a more informative strategy, Abaza said. 

The Paris Agreement had urged member states to propose NDCs outlining endeavours, and needs to reach the goal of the Paris Agreement with regard to national conditions.

Egypt submitted NDCs that, according to a number of environmentalists, lacked important details on its strategy, data and figures, and turned a blind eye on Egypt’s use of coal in its energy mix.

Abaza added that Egypt will have to work on adaptation and mitigation strategies in parallel, and use the current funding resources to materialize its development plans instead of waiting for new funding flows.