Another 14 national and sub-national governments, including Italy and New York City, on Sunday signed up to the ‘Under 2 MOU’, an international effort to keep global warming below 2 degrees.

Participants to the agreement pledge to cut their GHG emissions to 80-95% below 1990 levels or to below 2 tonnes per capita by 2050.

With the new members, the 38 jurisdictions that have joined the Under 2 MOU now represent more than $8.7 trillion in GDP and more than 313 million people.

“Business as usual simply won’t do when our very survival is at stake, and as local leaders, we must use all tools at hand to address climate change head on,” New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a statement.

Signatories aim to cooperate on technology-sharing, emission reporting and developing mid-term targets to support the long-term ambition, but leaves it up to each jurisdiction to design their own policies to meet targets.

Italy will be joined in the next few days by the Netherlands and Luxembourg as the only three national governments to have signed up so far, a statement from California Governor Jerry Brown – one of the founding members – said.

In addition to New York, several other big cities also signed up on Sunday, including Dakar (Senegal), Greater Manchester, Mexico City, San Francisco and Vancouver, along with Japan’s Gifu prefecture and Canada’s Northwest Territories.

Sub-national governments from Mozambique, Nepal, Peru and Portugal also joined.

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