Environmental negotiation is always riddled with a series of battles between ideal and reality, will and action, the rich and the poor, but the impact of not preventing environmental degradation falls on all of people. In international arena, every nation tries to lower its risk and burden and impose more responsibility to others. Climate change negotiation is an exemplar case of such battles. In 2015, almost all the nations agreed and signed the Paris Climate Agreement, a barely gotten outcome based on the consensus preventing the worst case scenario of the humankind. This presentation explains the significant meaning and the major content of the Paris Agreement in a context of environmental negotiation and touches on the Korea's position in negotiation processes. Taking on that, the speaker goes on to revisit Korea's updated NDC and the basic plan to reach the goal of carbon neutrality by 2050.

Mr. Kwon Sei-joong is currently Minister and Consul General in the Korean Embassy in Washington D.C. He was a former Director-General for Climate Change, Energy, and Environment and Scientific Affairs Bureau since November 2017 following the Deputy Director-General in the same Bureau for more than a year and half. He assumed the Director of Protocol in the Prime Minister’s Secretariat and the Director of Policy Analysis Division, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Republic of Korea. While working as director in charge of policy analysis and planning, he initiated the formulation of Korea’s basic foreign policy strategy as a middle power, contributing to complete ‘Intermediate Diplomatic Strategy’ in the period of 2013-2017. Before assuming the Directorship in MOFA, he was Director of Administration and International Organization Conversion at the Global Green Growth Institute in 2012-2013 with the responsibility of executing administrative and managerial affairs including tasks related to the conversion of the GGGI into a full-fledged international organization. As a career diplomat in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Korea, he formerly served as Counselor and Deputy Head of Mission of the Korean Embassy in Kazakhstan (2010-2012) and as Director for Administrative and Political Affairs in the Korean Embassy in China (2008-2010).

Prior to his service overseas, he served as Assistant Secretary to the President for Information and Policy Monitoring regarding Foreign and Unification Affairs at the Office of the President from 2006 to 2008. He was Deputy Director of the Environmental Cooperation Division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade from 2005 to 2006 where he led the efforts to formulate Korea’s position within UNFCCC climate change framework.

From 2001 to 2002, he served as Deputy Director of the North America Division III where he worked for strengthening the ROK-US Alliance, particularly from early stages of the war on terror. He updated and published the ROK/US Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), and contributed in the arrangement of an environmental management guideline called “Environmental Information Exchange and Access Procedures” between Korea and US Armed Forces in Korea. He joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs when he passed the Foreign Service Examination in 1994.

He received his education from both Korea and abroad. He earned a Ph. D. in Political Science at Kyungnam University in 2015. He attained his LLM from Northwestern University, Diploma of Higher European Studies from the Institut D’Études Politiques de Paris, IEP and BA in Political Science from Seoul National University. He is fluent in both written and spoken English, intermediate in Chinese and French. He is married with one daughter and two sons.

John Furlow is the Director of the International Research Institute for Climate and Society. He joined IRI in 2017 as its Deputy Director for Humanitarian Assistance and International Development and became its Director in May 2021. John’s focus is on connecting complex climate science to decision making to improve lives and livelihoods in developing countries. He is interested in policy reform that reflects the value of climate information in supporting important socio-economic sectors, such as agriculture and public health. He currently leads ACToday Columbia World Project work in Vietnam, developing climate services and integrating climate information into policy and practice to contribute to ending hunger, achieving food security and improved nutrition, and promoting sustainable agriculture (SDG2). He also developed an executive education course on the UN climate negotiations and their role in US foreign policy and support for international development.

Prior to coming to IRI, John designed and led the Climate Change Adaptation Program in USAID’s climate change office. He advised the government of Jamaica in the development of its national climate change policy and its climate smart agriculture sector plan. In 2015, he worked at the US Department of State designing and managing the National Adaptation Plan (NAP) Global Network as part of US preparations for the UN Climate Conference in Paris.

Eunjin is a Research Agricultural Engineer at the US Department of Agriculture - Agricultural Research Service. She has been working on integrating advanced climate information, remote sensing data, and agro-hydrological models for agricultural climate risk management and supporting decisions from the farm scale to the policy level. She received her Ph.D. degree in Civil Engineering from Purdue University.