COP29 Shocker: Africa’s $1.3T climate finance hope dashed?
By Aliu Akoshile, in Baku
Hope that Africa and the rest of developing countries would secure a $1.3 trillion climate finance commitment at the COP29 in Baku may have been dashed.
Chair of African Group of Negotiators at the UN climate summit, Ambassador Ali Mohamed, disclosed this in his reaction to the ten-page draft resolution on the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) on climate finance, on Thursday.
“The elephant in the room”, said Mohamed, “is the lack of a quantum proposal, and the text does not specify numerical figures for the proposed mobilisation goal, or for the provision element, despite a common position from the G77 and China on a $1.3 trillion annual mobilisation goal.”
NatureNews, the African voice on climate change, had reported exclusively on Monday that there were dilemmas over climate finance based on feelers it picked from developed countries’ negotiators around the delegates’ meeting rooms.
As the continent that is worst hit by climate adversities, Africa had approached the UN climate summit with a harmonised overaching agenda that was predicated on “solidarity in scaling climate finance for Africa”.
The capacious African Pavilion, which was hosted by the African Union Commission (AUC), African Development Bank Group (AfDB), Africa Union Development Agency (AU-NEPAD), and Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), also projected the agenda’s tagline.
Before the negotiation reached its crescendo this week, delegates from the global south had toyed with different climate finance figures ranging from $1.7 trillion to $1.4 trillion, which were considered just and equitable considering the magnitude of the climate challenges faced by the developing countries.
Pius Alabi, director of green growth and partnerships at Climate Africa Media Initiative and Centre (CAMIC), said it was this expectation that made African negotiators anxious to see the draft resolution on climate finance.
“But the entire continent was disappointed to hear that the draft was silent on any figures that could form the basis of horse trading on the negotiation table ”, he said.
Also, the director of Moroccan climate think-tank, Imal Initiative for Climate and Development (IICD) said he was “at a loss for words at how disappointed we are at this stage to have come this far without serious numbers on the table and serious engagement from the
developed countries”.
For Andreas Sieber, associate
director of global policy
and campaigns at 350.org
environmental group, “the fight is up”.
In a detailed reaction, Ambassador Mohamed, who is also the Special Envoy of Kenyan President on Climate Change, said the refusal of developed countries to scale up climate finance “is not just morally wrong, it’s economically short-sighted”.
According to him, “every $1 invested in making infrastructure resilient saves US$4 in reconstruction. A $1.8 trillion investment could generate $7.1 trillion in benefits by 2030.
“To the international community”, he charged, “Triple, don’t double, adaptation funding by 2025. Shift from loans to grants. Act now because every day of delay makes our challenge more expensive and more difficult.”
“This is the reason we are here, identifying a Quantified Goal, but we are no closer, and we need the developed countries to urgently engage on this matter”, he said.
While the negotiation is expected to wrap up on Friday, there are strong indications it will spill over to Saturday unless the developed countries’ negotiators make concessions instead of digging into their hardline positions.
The UN top echelon is as worried as the rest of the world.
Simon Stiell who heads the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), convener of the annual COP, was hesitant in his reactions as he issued a stern warning to negotiators to avoid frustrating the communique with brinkmanship, and also commended “leaders of the world’s largest economies who have committed to driving forward financial reforms to put strong climate actions within the reach of every nation”.
For Antonio Guterres, UN Secretary General and chief promoter of the COP, the overarching goal of the global body is that the Baku “climate conference must not fail…because failure is not an option”.
In requesting “G20 leaders to instruct their ministers and negotiators to agree to a new ambitious climate finance goal at COP29, Mr. Guterres expressed apprehension that that failure to reach an acceptable agreement in Baku “would inevitably also make the success of COP30 in Brazil much more difficult”.