German Foreign Minister Jochen Flasbarth and Canadian Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson have agreed to lead developed countries in developing a plan on how to achieve the collectively mobilizing climate finance target of $100 billion annually through 2025.
After 100 days as preparations continue, the United Kingdom will host the Twenty-sixth Summit of the Parties on Climate Change (COP26) to be held in Glasgow from 31 October to 12 November 2021, with the aim of accelerating work towards achieving the goals of the conference. The Paris Agreement and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
It is considered one of the most important international meetings in which high expectations are maintained regarding the issues being addressed, such as negotiations, decisions and commitments of the participating countries, especially in the face of the effects of extreme climate change that are already being worked on. perceptible, especially among the most vulnerable, which is expected to continue to increase with severity and frequency.
Previous Ministerial Discussion
According to the revised press release on the summit’s official website, over the two-day period, more than 50 ministers and high-level representatives, including the Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations and the Executive Secretary of the Council, as well as various representatives of civil society. and Indigenous Peoples informally at the end of last July, both in person and online, to discuss their expectations for the upcoming COP26, including the form and content of the Glasgow outcomes, as well as the pending negotiations.
In this sense, ministers during the meeting emphasized that Glasgow must maintain a 1.5°C range to limit the effects of climate change, address ambition gaps in adaptation, mitigation, loss and damage and financing, as well as complete the Paris Regulation. For integrity and credibility, as a political imperative to ensure real and tangible progress on all these issues during this crucial decade to 2030.
Many also noted “the need to urgently expand climate finance, expressing disappointment in a timely manner that the $100 billion target has not yet been achieved”.
Including also accelerated measures to gradually reduce coal-based energy and its financing, and also consider an equitable energy transition in terms of the context of common and differentiated responsibilities, taking into account the relevant capabilities according to different national conditions.
Funding Mobilization
At that meeting, many ministers recognized that finance is becoming a facilitator to drive ambitious climate action at scale and that it is necessary to connect others.
In general, it is stated that “developed countries must determine how to mobilize $100 billion annually until 2025, and support the proposed delivery plan or roadmap for doing so, although this collective goal has not yet been achieved.”
Some ministers stressed that the Paris targets can only be secured by rapidly mobilizing significantly higher levels of climate finance from all sources, including public international climate finance, national and private flows, and the importance of ensuring that all finance is consistent with the lower level. emissions and climate resistance.
Among some of the mentioned innovations, green bonds, which have been helping to raise funds to improve procedures, were commented on, noting also that this growth in climate finance from national and private sources and international support is instrumental in meeting the needs of developing countries.
Demonstrate that there is a need to improve the access, quality and effectiveness of climate finance, which should also include a significant increase in levels of adaptation finance, as well as the importance of grant-based and concessional finance given the limited space tax for many vulnerable countries in the context of COVID-19 .
In this regard, the importance of advancing debt beyond direct provision of climate finance was highlighted and some ministers suggested considering debt swaps. Noting that “many countries face challenges in obtaining concessional financing despite being highly vulnerable to climate change.”
Among the proposals presented, it was surprising that what the minister proposed could be a $750 billion mobilization target consisting of public and private subcomponents. Getting support from some ministers, while others have expressed major concerns about putting numbers on the table before deliberations begin.
German Foreign Minister Jochen Flasbarth and Canadian Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson have agreed to lead developed countries in developing a plan on how to achieve the collectively mobilizing climate finance target of $100 billion annually until 2025, which must be discussed during the next COP26.
The author is an attorney, chair of the Energy Law and Sustainability Committee of the National Association of Jurists of Panama, co-founder of Mujer y Energía and member of the International Network on Energy, Climate Change and Human Rights.
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