The current global financial meltdown should not knock the climate change agenda off course, Professor Ross Garnaut says.
The federal opposition this week called for an emissions trading scheme, due to start by 2010, to be delayed because of the financial crisis.
But the federal government's climate change adviser said today the financial situation would ease.
"If we were negotiating an international agreement this week, then it would be a major problem," Prof Garnaut today told a Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) forum in Sydney.
"But financial crises (are) very damaging, hugely damaging, but they pass.
"In climate change, we're dealing with a long term structural change that will still be here when the financial crisis has passed.
"We've got to be careful we're not knocked off course."
Prof Garnaut earlier this week released his long-awaited 620-page final report on what the nation should do about climate change.
After infuriating green groups earlier this month by calling for a 10 per cent cut in Australia's emissions by 2020, he's now more open to a deeper 25 per cent cut.
