Cop29
agrees $1.3tn climate finance deal but campaigners brand it a ‘betrayal’
Deep
divisions remain after high-stakes talks end with agreement to help developing
world shift to low-carbon economy
Fiona
Harvey, Adam Morton, Dharna Noor and Damian Carrington
Sat 23 Nov
2024 23.47 GMT
Rich and
poor countries concluded a trillion-dollar deal on the climate crisis in the
early hours of Sunday morning, after marathon talks and days of bitter
recriminations ended in what campaigners said was a “betrayal”.
The
developing world will receive at least $1.3tn (£1tn) a year in funds to help
them shift to a low-carbon economy and cope with the impacts of extreme
weather, by 2035.
But only
$300bn of that will come in the form they are most in need of – grants and
low-interest loans from the developed world. The rest will have to come from
private investors and a range of potential new sources of money, such as
possible levies on fossil fuels and frequent flyers, which have yet to be
agreed.
Mohamed
Adow, director of the Power Shift Africa thinktank, said: “This [summit] has
been a disaster for the developing world. It’s a betrayal of both people and
planet, by wealthy countries who claim to take climate change seriously. Rich
countries have promised to ‘mobilise’ some funds in the future, rather than
provide them now. The cheque is in the mail. But lives and livelihoods in
vulnerable countries are being lost now.”
Some of the
world’s poorest and most vulnerable countries fought hard during two weeks of
fraught negotiations at the Cop29 UN summit in Azerbaijan’s capital Baku for a
bigger slice of the money to come directly from developed countries. They also
wanted more of the available finance to go to the countries most in need,
instead of being shared with bigger emerging economies, such as India.
Two groups
of particularly vulnerable nations, the Alliance of Small Island States and the
Least Developed Countries, walked out of one meeting in protest late on
Saturday afternoon, but later returned.
The talks
were high-stakes from the start, as they opened just days after Donald Trump
won re-election as US president. Trump intends to withdraw the US from the
Paris agreement when he takes office in January and is likely to be hostile to
providing any climate finance to the developing world.
Faced with
the prospect of reconvening next year with a Trump White House in place, many
countries decided that failure to agree on a new financial settlement in Baku
was too much of a risk.
Developed
countries insisted they could not offer any more, owing to their own budgetary
constraints. “We will shoulder all the risk” if the US fails to contribute to
climate finance in future, pointed out one negotiator.
Many
developing world countries, including India, Bolivia, Cuba and Nigeria, reacted
furiously to the deal.
Green
campaigners also slammed the deal. Claudio Angelo, of the Observatorio do Clima
in Brazil, said: “Rich countries spent 150 years appropriating the world’s
atmospheric space, 33 years loitering on climate action, and three years
negotiating [a financial settlement] without putting numbers on the table. Now,
with the help of an incompetent Cop presidency and using the forthcoming Trump
administration as a threat, they force developing countries to accept a deal
that not only doesn’t represent any actual new money but also may increase
their debt.”
India raised
last-minute objections but failed to prevent it from being gavelled through by
the Cop president, Azerbaijan’s environment minister Mukhtar Babayev. The
country said it “could not accept” the settlement.
The host
country was strongly criticised for its running of the Cop. Oil and gas make up
90% of Azerbaijan’s exports and fossil fuel interests were highly visible at
the talks.
Saudi Arabia
also played a highly obstructive role, according to many insiders. In one
extraordinary development, a Saudi official attempted to alter one key text
without full consultation. The petro-state also tried repeatedly to remove
references to the “transition away from fossil fuels” which was agreed at last
year’s Cop28 summit.
“It was
clear from day one that Saudi Arabia and other fossil fuel-producing countries
were going to do everything in their power to weaken the landmark Cop28
agreement on fossil fuels. At Cop29 they have deployed obstructionist tactics
to dilute action on the energy transition,” said Romain Ioualalen, of the
pressure group Oil Change International.
The US and
China – the world’s two biggest economies, and biggest emitters of greenhouse
gases – are normally key nations at the annual “conference of the parties”
(Cop) under the UN framework convention on climate change. But neither played
much of a public role in Baku, allowing other countries to drive the talks. The
US delegation is still made up of officials from Joe Biden’s administration,
but the looming presidency of Donald Trump cast a pall over their
participation.
The deal
will mean China will contribute to climate finance for the poor world
voluntarily, unlike rich countries which are obliged to provide cash.
Ani
Dasgupta, chief executive of the US-based World Resources Institute thinktank,
said: “Despite major headwinds, negotiators in Baku eked out a deal that at
least triples climate finance flowing to developing countries [from a previous
longstanding goal of $100bn a year]. The $300bn goal is not enough, but is an
important down payment toward a safer, more equitable future. The agreement
recognises how critical it is for vulnerable countries to have better access to
finance that does not burden them with unsustainable debt.”
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