Baku, Azerbaijan — The climate talks of the United Nations adopted an agreement on Sunday to inject at least $300 billion annually as part of the fight against climate change. The funds will aim Help poor nations cope with the ravages of global warming after tense negotiations in the city where oil was first extracted.
The $300,000 million will be allocated to developing countries that need the money to stop depending on coal, oil and gas that cause the planet to overheat, adapt to future warming and pay for the damage caused by the extreme weather of climate change. It is not the $1.3 billion that developing nations were asking for, but the amount is three times greater than the $100 billion a year agreement granted by an agreement that is about to expire. Some of the delegations noted that this pact is a step in the right direction, with the hope that more money will come in in the future.
It was not exactly the consensus agreement that usually results from these types of meetings, and developing nations were extremely outraged at being ignored.
COP29 President Mukhtar Babayev approved the agreement before any nation had a chance to speak. When they did, they attacked him for acting unfairly towards developing countries, criticizing that the amount established was not enough and that the world’s wealthiest nations were too stingy.
The COP29 talks presidency said a final draft text on dollar amounts will be published soon. Prasad said he had been consulted about it and it will be enough because there are options for it to grow.
“It is an insignificant sum”said Indian negotiator Chandni Raina, who repeatedly pointed out that her country was against the pact, sparking applause. “I am sorry to say that we cannot accept it.”
He added to The Associated Press that he has lost all faith in the United Nations system.
discontented nations
A large number of countries agreed with India. By NigeriaNkiruka Maduekwe, Director General of the National Council on Climate Changedescribed the pact as an insult and a joke.
“I think we should rethink this. As countries, we have the right to choose whether we want to accept this or not. And I tell you that we do not accept this,” he said. “It’s 3 in the morning and they tell us, ‘this is what we’re going to do.’ “I don’t think so.”
The final package “does not reflect or inspire confidence that we can get out of this serious problem of climate change,” Raina said. “The goal (of receiving up to $300 billion by 2035) is too few and far between”.
“We are completely opposed to the unfair manner in which it was acted,” Raina added. “The actions of the president and the secretary are extremely damaging to us.”
On behalf of nearly 50 of the world’s poorest nations, Evans Davie Njewa of Malawi was more subtle, expressing what he called reservations about the deal.
Meanwhile, the Secretary General of the United Nations António Guterres published on the social network But he stressed that the agreement “provides a basis on which to work.”
Relief among some after intense negotiations
Some parties were somewhat satisfied. Wopke Hoektra, of the European Unionpointed out that it is a new era for the climate financeand hard work to help the most vulnerable.
But some activists present began coughing to try to interrupt Hoekstra.
Eamon Ryan, Environment Minister Irelandsaid the agreement was “a great relief.”
“There was nothing certain. “This was complicated,” he said. “Being a time of division, of war, of various problems in the multilateral system, the fact that we have achieved this in these very complicated circumstances is really important.”
The executive secretary of the United Nations climate change agency, Simon Stiell, said that the pact is “an insurance policy for humanity,” adding that, like insurance, “it only works if the premiums are paid for it.” complete and on time.”
The agreement also represents a critical step in helping beneficiary countries create more ambitious targets to limit or reduce emissions of heat-trapping gases, which were due to be met by early next year. It is part of the plan to continue reducing pollution with new objectives every five years, which was agreed in the UN talks in Paris in 2015.
The Paris agreement established the system of regularly raising climate change targets as a way to keep warming below 2.7° Fahrenheit above pre-industrial levels. The world is already 2.3° F above those levels and carbon emissions continue to rise.
There is hope that more money will arrive in the future
Countries also anticipate that this agreement will send signals that will help boost financing from other sources, such as multilateral development banks and the private sector. That was always part of the discussion in these negotiations: rich countries did not believe it was realistic to depend solely on public financing sources, but Poor countries worried that if the money came in the form of loans rather than grants, it would push them further back into a debt they already struggle with.
“The $300 billion target is not enough, but it is an important step toward a more secure and equitable future,” said Ani Dasgupta, president of the World Resources Institute. “This agreement is a start for us. “We now face the challenge of raising much more financing to combat climate change from a variety of public and private sources, putting the entire financial system to work for the transitions of developing countries.”
And while it is far from the $1.3 billion needed, it is more than the $250 billion that had been proposed in an initial draft.which outraged many countries and led to a period of frustration and stagnation in the final hours of the summit.
Other agreements
The various texts adopted early Sunday morning included a subtle but non-specific reference to the Global Stocktaking that was approved last year in Dubai. Last year there were strong discussions around unusual wording that referred to the elimination of oil, coal and natural gas, but it was finally modified to urge countries to carry out an energy transition that reduces the use of fossil fuels. The latest negotiations only referred to the Dubai agreement, but did not explicitly repeat the call for a transition that reduces the use of fossil fuels.
The countries also agreed to adopt Article 6, which would create markets to trade carbon credits, an idea that was established as part of the 2015 Paris Agreement to help nations work together to reduce pollution caused by climate change. Part of that was a carbon credit system that allows nations to generate planet-warming gases if they offset emissions elsewhere. Supporters said a U.N.-backed market could generate up to an additional $250 billion a year in financial aid to combat the climate change.
Despite their approval, carbon markets remain a controversial plan as many experts say that the new rules adopted do not prevent misuse, do not work and give large polluters an excuse to continue generating emissions.
“What they have essentially done is undermine the mandate of trying to reach 1.5,” said Tamara Gilbertson, climate justice program coordinator at the Indigenous Environmental Networka coalition of indigenous and environmental groups based in Minnesota, United States. An Lambrechts, a biodiversity policy expert at Greenpeace, called it a “climate trap” with many loopholes.
Now that the agreement has been finalized and teams are already dismantling the temporary venue where the negotiations took place, many have their eyes on the climate negotiations that will take place next year in Belem, Brazil.