A fund aimed at having wealthy nations that profited from fossil fuels during the Industrial Revolution compensate developing countries is taking shape at the COP29 U.N. Climate Summit in Baku, Azerbaijan.
The Loss and Damage Fund, agreed upon at COP27, is now being finalized at COP29, which began on Nov. 11 and runs until Nov. 22.
“Politicians have the power to reach a fair and ambitious deal,” COP29 President Mukhtar Babayev said during a Nov. 18 press conference. “They must deliver and engage immediately and constructively.”
The World Bank, a global financial institution providing loans and grants to developing countries, has been appointed as an interim trustee.
“Worsening climate impacts will put inflation on steroids unless every country can take bolder climate action,” Stiell said. “Let’s not make that mistake again. Climate finance is global inflation insurance. Rampant climate costs should be public enemy number one.”
On Nov. 18, Stiell called for countries to “cut the theatrics and get down to real business.”
Some U.N. human rights experts interpret extreme weather events in poorer countries as a climate emergency caused by historical power imbalances rooted in colonialism.
$1.3 Trillion
Activists have called for more money for loss and damage, publishing an open letter to the COP presidency.The Loss and Damage Collaboration (LDC)—whose letter includes signatures from the Heinrich Böll Foundation, an environmentalist group affiliated with the German Greens, and the socialist Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung think tank—is advocating a new collective quantified goal (NCQG) on climate finance.
It called for the NCQG to be established before 2025, with a target of at least $1.3 trillion annually for mitigation, adaptation, and loss and damage.
Tim Worstall, senior fellow of the Adam Smith Institute, told The Epoch Times that the LDC appears unwilling “to listen to the actual evidence.”
“The High Level Expert Group just gave us a sensible estimation of the finance required, 50 percent of which comes from capitalists, 25 percent from existing multilateral financiers, and the other 25 percent probably isn’t needed,” he said. “If renewables are so cheap, as we’re constantly told they are, then why does anyone need a subsidy to install them?”
Smith said the claim is that poor nations require subsidies.
“The only good reason for poverty these days is bad governance,” he said. “Sending subsidies to bad governments has a certain illogic to it.”
A spokesperson for LDC told The Epoch Times that the group believes that climate finance is a moral obligation.
Carbon Credits
Negotiators are working toward a separate plan of up to $1 trillion annually in climate financing for developing countries, aiming to replace the previous $100 billion target.On the first day of the conference, negotiators agreed to establish a U.N.-backed system for trading carbon credits, aiming to support a decade-long goal of introducing a centralized carbon market by next year.
According to the United Nations, carbon credits are measured in metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent and can be purchased by individuals, businesses, and organizations to offset emissions or support environmental projects.
Samuel Furfari, who was a senior official at the EU’s Energy Directorate-General from 1982 to 2018, expressed surprise at the timing of the agreement.