Context: Recently, Indian government constituted Apex Committee for the Implementation of the Paris Agreement (AIPA) to ensure coordinated response to climate change matters and to keep the country on track towards meeting its climate change obligations under the Paris Agreement, which includes Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). 
India’s Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs)

• These are the accounts of the voluntary efforts to be made by countries that are a part of the Paris Agreement, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the impacts of anthropogenic climate change.

India had submitted its NDCs in 2015. The three quantitative goals in the Indian NDCs are:

• A 33-35 percent reduction in the gross domestic product emissions intensity by 2030 from 2005 levels.
• A 40 percent share of non-fossil fuel based electricity by 2030.
• Creating a carbon sink of 2.5-3 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide through afforestation programmes.
• Apart from these, there are five other non-quantitative goals in the Indian NDCs.
• The NDCs are to be implemented in the post-2020 period. 

About the AIPA

• The committee, with the secretary, Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) as the chairperson, has been constituted with the purpose of ensuring a coordinated response on climate change matters that protects the country’s interests.
• The committee will ensure that India is on track towards meeting its climate change obligations under the Paris Agreement including its submitted Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).
• With its 17 members, it has the responsibility of formulating policies and programmes for implementing them.
• The AIPA also has the responsibility of regularly communicating and reporting the NDCs to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
• It will also define the responsibilities of the government ministries that would be crucial in achieving the country’s climate change mitigation and adaptation goals.
• The AIPA will also act as a national authority for the regulation of carbon markets in India under the Paris Agreement.

Significance

• Will be crucial for raising India’s concerns around climate financing and carbon markets.
• To take the issue of carbon credits (from Kyoto Protocol) forward, which was one of the hottest points of contention at Madrid (COP 25). 

Paris Climate Agreement

• It is a historic international accord signed in 2015, that brings almost 200 countries together in setting a common target to reduce global greenhouse emissions in an effort to fight climate change.
• The Paris Agreement comes under the broad umbrella of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). 
• UNFCCC is a convention held in 1992 to combat climate change. 
• Kyoto Protocol (1997) was another major international commitment under UNFCCC.

Provisions

• The pact seeks to keep global temperature rise to below 2 degrees celsius from pre-industrial levels, and to try and limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
• For this, each country has pledged to implement targeted action plans that will limit their greenhouse gas emissions.
• Under the agreement, rich and developed countries will provide financial and technological support to the developing world in their quest to fight and adapt to climate change.