COP29 Draft Proposes $250 Billion Annual Payment to Poor Nations

Activists participate in a demonstration for climate finance at the COP29 U.N. Climate Summit in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Nov. 21, 2024. Sergei Grits /AP Photo

A new draft text from the COP29 climate summit is calling for $250 billion per year from developed nations to poorer countries.

The COP29 climate summit presidency released the draft finance deal on Friday, as world governments in Baku, Azerbaijan, try to agree on a sweeping funding plan to tackle climate finance that would see an annual transfer of money. The summit began on Nov. 11 and runs until Nov. 22.

“We need a core of public finance closer to $1 trillion, along with additional finance from other sources, to power the transformational changes we need to limit warming to 1.5°C and to increase climate resilience,” Samuel Furfari, a former senior official at the EU’s Energy Directorate-General, told The Epoch Times, noting that the event was in its 29th year.

Negotiators have until Friday to finalize the agreement, with discussions spilling into overtime said to be clouded by uncertainty over the role of the United States under pro-fossil fuel advocate President-elect Donald Trump.

As well as the $250 billion, the draft also set a broader goal to raise $1.3 trillion in climate finance annually by 2035, which would include funding from all public and private sources.

‘5 Percent Off GDP’

Simon Stiell, the U.N. climate change executive secretary, said that unchecked climate effects could drive global inflation.

Stiell urged leaders on Nov. 12 to “reform the global financial system,” describing climate finance as “global inflation insurance.”

On Nov. 20, he said, “No nation is winning this fight. Every economy is being besieged by climate disasters, ripping up to 5 percent off GDP in some countries. And it’s people and businesses that are paying the heaviest price.”

“We conducted an extensive and inclusive consultation process that extended into the early hours of the morning,” COP29 said in a statement.

Inadequate

Daniel Lund, a negotiator for Fiji, told Reuters there was still a long way to go.

“It is a very low number in relation to the available evidence on the scale of the need that exists and understanding of how those needs will evolve,” he said.

Activists also criticized the proposed amount as insufficient.

Stephen Cornelius, WWF Deputy Global Climate and Energy Lead, said on Nov. 22: “The climate finance text is completely inadequate. It now has a finance target, but it completely misses the mark. The amount is far too low, and rich countries don’t even commit to delivering all of it.

“It’s always the same thing,” Furfari, the former senior official at the EU’s Energy Directorate-General, said.

“The only difference this year is that there are no activists in polar bear outfits. This year they are not there because they know it’s ridiculous, as polar bears are growing in numbers.”

He also pointed out that Arab countries refused any mention of fossil fuels in the text.

The Arab Group reported on Nov. 21 that the 22-nation group rejected any U.N. climate deal targeting fossil fuels.

“The Arab Group will not accept any text that targets any specific sectors, including fossil fuel,” Albara Tawfiq, a Saudi official speaking for the bloc, told delegates in Baku.

The Loss and Damage Fund

The Loss and Damage Fund is still being finalized at COP29. The fund aims to have wealthy nations that profited from fossil fuels during the Industrial Revolution compensate developing countries.

A work plan for 2024–2025 was adopted on Nov. 18, with final management and financial details expected soon. Nearly $700 million was pledged to the fund last year.

Some U.N. human rights experts link extreme weather events in poorer nations to historical power imbalances rooted in colonialism.

“[Between 1850 and 2002,] industrialized countries produced three times the carbon dioxide produced by the entire Global South,” U.N. Special Rapporteur Tendayi Achiume said in 2022, citing a 2020 research paper.

“Yet it is the Global South, and colonially designated non-white regions of the world, that are most affected and least able to mitigate and survive the global ecological crisis, in significant part due to the colonial processes that caused historical emissions in the first place.”

The Loss and Damage Collaboration (LDC), which is supported by the Heinrich Böll Foundation, an environmentalist group affiliated with the German Greens, and the socialist Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung think tank, called for $1.3 trillion annually for mitigation, adaptation, and loss and damage.

A spokesperson for LDC previously told The Epoch Times that the group believes that climate finance is a moral obligation.

“Developed countries have a climate debt that they owe to developing countries for causing the climate crisis and for atmospheric appropriation,” the spokesperson said.

Reuters contributed to this report.