Failure at the COP30 meeting. Governments have not reached an agreement on phasing out fossil fuels
Climate summit in Belem Photo: Pablo PORCIUNCULA / AFP / Profimedia
The world's governments agreed on Saturday on a compromise climate agreement at the COP30 conference in Brazil, which would boost financing for poor countries facing global warming, but omits any mention of the fossil fuels that cause it, reports Reuters, taken by News.ro.
By concluding the agreement, the countries sought to demonstrate global unity in addressing the impact of climate change, even after the largest generator in history, the United States, refused to send an official delegation.
But the agreement, which was reached after two weeks of contentious negotiations in the Amazon city of Belem, also exposed the differences between rich and developing countries, as well as between governments with opposing views on oil, gas and coal.
After approving the agreement, COP30 president Andre Correa do Lago admitted that the negotiations had been difficult. “We know that some of you had higher ambitions regarding some of the issues discussed,” he said.
The European Union was the main obstacle to the adoption of a wording on the abandonment of fossil fuels, but eventually agreed to abandon it after a coalition of countries, including Saudi Arabia, the largest oil exporter, declared it unacceptable.
“We should support (the deal) because at least it's going in the right direction,” European climate commissioner Wopke Hoekstra told reporters before the deal was approved.
“What's going on here goes beyond incompetence”
Some countries took a harsher tone. “A climate decision that doesn't even mention fossil fuels is not neutrality, it's complicity. And what's happening here goes beyond incompetence,” said Juan Carlos Monterrey, Panama's climate negotiator.
The agreement launches a voluntary initiative to accelerate climate action to help countries meet their existing commitments to reduce emissions, and calls on rich countries to at least triple the amount of money they allocate to help developing countries adapt to global warming by 2035.
Scientists said existing national emissions reduction commitments have significantly reduced projected warming, but are not enough to prevent global temperatures from rising 1.5°C above industrial levels, a threshold that could trigger the worst effects of climate change.
Developing countries, meanwhile, have argued that they urgently need funds to adapt to impacts that are already being felt, such as rising sea levels and worsening heat waves, droughts, floods and storms.
Avinash Persaud, special adviser to the president of the Inter-American Development Bank, a multilateral lender focused on Latin America and the Caribbean, said the deal's emphasis on financing is important given the intensifying impacts of climate change.
“But I'm afraid the world has yet to deliver faster-release subsidies to developing countries facing loss and damage. This goal is as urgent as it is difficult,” he said.
