Voice of Real Australia: Australia must stop being a punching bag in carbon emissions fight

Australia attracts a lot of attention in the global climate change debate for a country with around 0.33 per cent of the world's 7.9 billion people.

Australia emits 1.2 per cent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions which, let's be honest, indicates we Aussies do need to reduce our carbon footprint.

But does Australia deserve to be singled out by world leaders like the UK's Boris Johnson and America's Joe Biden for failing to set more "ambitious" greenhouse gas reduction targets?

Many world leaders have recently been falling over themselves making pledges that their countries will achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050.

Even China, the world's biggest carbon polluter, has set 2060 as its target year to become carbon neutral.

However, few details have been provided on just how these targets will be achieved and don't hold your breath waiting for them.

Unfortunately "ambitious targets" and vague "roadmaps", while generating a lot of media hot air, won't produce significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

The world is expected to have a population of almost 10 billion by 2050 with much of that growth occurring in developing countries like India, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Congo, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Indonesia and Egypt.

Will these new arrivals happily live on the breadline like most of their parents and grandparents as their contribution to stopping the steady rise in the world's thermometer or will they aspire to modern pleasures like cars, travel and big houses? The latter is the more likely.

If you listen to the noisy critics you'd be forgiven for thinking Australia is the main obstacle to a cooler earth.

And while many of these critics have political and other agendas, the present federal government has allowed itself to become an easy target for them by pandering far too much to climate-change deniers.

While the world is unlikely to ever achieve carbon neutral status - particularly if the human population continues to rise - the current worldwide switch to renewable energy offers a tremendous opportunity for Australians.

We have a talent for developing clever technology - see what's happening with agtech - which gives us the chance to build new and profitable industries around things like cheap green energy, solar power technology and electric vehicles.

It's time we stopped being lectured on the world stage by phonies pretending to be climate-change saviours and grabbed an amazing opportunity to rebuild our manufacturing sector.

We have the natural resources and the human capital just waiting to be invested. Australia can be a major contributor to reducing carbon emissions through innovative technology.

It's time Australia got smart and left our critics in our dust.

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