Former Mexican President and also chairman of the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, Felipe Calderón Hinojosa, attended the presentation of the report "Better Growth, Better Climate", which was held in Rome.
The report shows that it is possible to generate economic growth and combat climate change at the same time.
In the conference "The New Climate Economy: How Economic Growth and Sustainability can go hand in hand" business and social leaders met with senior Vatican officials to discuss how climate action can spur economic growth.
Calderón said governments must give a clear signal at the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Paris at the end of the year that they are serious about reducing carbon emissions and promoting investments in the green economy.
"Innovation is the secret to economic growth," he said, and "people with money are sitting on a bench," not investing yet, but waiting to see if governments will support new, clean technologies.
Besides being an ethical issue, he said, "climate action is in our own economic interest; we can reduce poverty, increase employment and, at the same time, bring down the emissions responsible for global warming."