Di Caprio among celebrities backing new climate initiative

Actor Leonardo Di Caprio joined former US vice president Al Gore and other personalities Wednesday in backing a new initiative to seek solutions to climate change. 

Leading figures from politics, economics, science and entertainment are lending their support to Countdown, which seeks to build support for zero-net emissions and is organised by the TED conference platform.

TED President Chris Anderson and former UN environment chief Christiana Figueres launched the programme in New York on Wednesday.

"The idea is not to plunge in with something competitive that's already out there but identify the best solutions ... to amplify them and activate them by bringing together these different groups," Anderson said.

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Hoesung Lee, and actors Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Joaquin Phoenix are among the figures backing Countdown.

YouTube, Global Citizen and the Climate Reality Project have also joined the partnership.

The collaboration seeks to develop the best proposals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the areas of power, the built environment, transport, food and nature to achieve a net carbon footprint of zero by 2050.

The best suggestions will then form the basis of talks to be delivered at a summit in Bergen, Norway in October 2020, a press release announcing the initiative said.