US withdrawal Paris agreement may affect climate change: Ban Ki-moon

Pauline Askin | Reuters

Adelie penguins stand atop a block of melting ice on a rocky shoreline at Cape Denison, Commonwealth Bay, in East Antarctica.

In 2016, the United States and China issued a joint statement confirming that both countries would sign the Paris Climate Agreement, which aims to tackle global warming, among other targets.

But U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from the agreement in 2017, saying the accord would have cost America trillions of dollars, killed jobs, and hindered the oil, gas, coal and manufacturing industries.

Ban told CNBC’s Oriel Morrison that there may be a need for $4 trillion annually to cover all 17 sustainable development goals to be reached by 2030, according to OECD projections.

He said, “It is not the amount of money that is at stake. If there is a political commitment by the important industrialized countries including European Union and also of course United States, then we can mobilize this money.”

— Reuters contributed to this report.