ENVIRONMENT// Last December, 190 countries came together in Paris, France and agreed to take steps to prevent the Earth’s climate from getting too much hotter. last month, 175 of those countries signed the Paris agreement. This is the first time that so many countries have moved fast to sign an international agreement — it shows that most countries are taking the climate change problem very seriously. Under the agreement, each country has to take specific action to halt global warming and switch to renewable and non-polluting sources of energy such as solar and wind energy. However, there are still some steps to be taken before the agreement can go into effect. Each country must get its own government or Parliament to also sign off on it. India too signed the agreement. As per Indian law, the climate change agreement does not have to be approved by Parliament. Instead, only the Prime Minister and his team of ministers are required to accept it. It is likely that this will happen in 2016 itself.