UN climate chief calls Paris agreement the “easy part” and calls for action at Davos

The United Nations’ top climate official Christiana Figueres says that the Paris climate agreement is the “easy part” and concerted work must now begin to implement the deal.

Ms Figueres played a central role in bringing 195 UN member states together from 30 November to 11 December to agree on the framework to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and limit global warming.

Figueres, the Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said that although the conference was a major success, "after 20 years of working towards that goal, that was the easy part."

Addressing ministers, business leaders and civil society at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Figueres said it was now crucial to move from words to action.

The UN climate chief said: "We need to understand the clear signal from Paris and the clear risks and work out what are we all going to do."

She called on fossil fuel companies to focus their resources into developing renewable energy and urged oil, gas and coal executives to consider sustainability and environmental protection over assets.

Figueres warned that fossil fuel reserves far exceed the carbon budget to avoid a dangerous average global temperature increase of 2 degrees Celsius and she also called on all citizens to become more conscientious in their daily choices in order to reduce emissions.

Figueres added: "My father said if things are going badly, continue in the battle, and if things are going well, find another battle… Everyone has agreed on the direction of travel so the next battle is to speed up along that direction of travel. The strength of Paris is that it builds a broad highway and allows countries to choose their lane of choice. The same is true is for everyone else."