The United Nations climate chief said on Thursday that “funding from rich countries must be at the heart” of any new deal to increase funding for poor countries to fight global warming.
Developing countries need trillions of dollars to finance clean energy and prepare for climate change, but the world can’t agree on how to finance it.
It is hoped that countries will be able to resolve the issue at next month’s UN COP29 climate change summit, despite disagreements over how much money is needed, what it will cover, who will pay for it and how. are.
Rich countries, such as the United States and the European Union, which have traditionally been most responsible for global warming, face pressure to increase their existing commitments of $100 billion a year to pay.
However, they cannot cover this cost on their own and will work with other countries to decide what kind of “climate finance” goals they will achieve when around 200 countries gather for COP29 in Azerbaijan. I think I would like them to do so.
“It’s not my job to prejudge what the new targets will be,” said Simon Steele, executive director of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The UNFCCC convenes COP negotiations but does not influence their decisions.
“But it is clear that public finance must be central. This finance must be as subsidized or concessional as possible, and it must be made more accessible to those who need it most. ”
Developing countries – most of the world in UNFCCC terms, from powerful emerging markets like China to low-lying island states – believe that historic polluters have a moral obligation to dig deep into their own pockets. claims.
They are also legally required under the 2015 Paris Climate Change Agreement to take the lead in providing and mobilizing such funds.
But some donors face financial and political constraints and balk at requests for large amounts of new funding from the budget.
They want private investment to play a bigger role, and hope that China, oil-rich Gulf states and other wealthy emerging markets can also help fill slots.
Steele said the question of who pays and how much could be resolved at COP29, adding: “But we’re not going there to renegotiate the Paris Agreement, we’re not. ” he said.
Azerbaijan said on Monday that developing countries need trillions of dollars in climate finance, but that its goal of pumping out hundreds of billions of dollars in public funds was more “realistic.”
Organizers expect more than 100 heads of state and government to attend the two-week summit, which begins on November 11 in the capital Baku.
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