L'Aquila (Italy), July 10 - India is hopeful that the issue of climate change will move forward with the G8 countries, the group of the world's most developed nations, discussing the setting up of a Green Fund.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's special envoy on climate change Shyam Saran said Friday that the step by the G8 to provide financial assistance to the Green Fund was a 'forward-looking one'.

'It is a forward-looking document and a positive advancement on what we have been able to achieve in the past,' Shyam Saran said after the G8-G5 outreach meeting at this quake-hit Italian town, about 100 km from Rome.

He said British Prime Minister Gordon Brown had suggested setting up the fund with $100 billion.

Though the developed and developing countries at the G8 and G5 summit agreed on various issues like tackling the global economic crisis and reforming international institutions, including the UN and financial institutions, differences over climate change and setting targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions remained.

The G8 countries have not committed themselves to the demand of the G5 that emissions be brought down by 40 percent by 2020 and by 80 percent by 2050.