A last-minute deal was reportedly reached at COP27 in Egypt to support poor countries affected by climate change. Climate Action Network Canada says such an agreement is “a historic moment.”
The agreement allows for the creation of a fund for poorer countries that bear the full brunt of climate change when they have contributed little to global warming since the pre-industrial era.
Sherry Rehman, Pakistan’s climate change minister and current chair of the powerful G77+China negotiating group, which includes more than 130 countries, told Agence France-Presse that she was “optimistic about a positive outcome” on the question.
“From the point of view of the African continent, we will be very happy if this decision is passed,” welcomed South Africa’s Environment Minister Barbara Creasy.
The Climate Action Network estimates that the economic costs of these losses in developing countries will be between $250 billion and $580 billion by 2030. According to the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), extreme weather events have killed 410,000 people and affected 1.7 billion in the past decade.
If ratified by representatives of the 200 countries present in Egypt, the agreement will be “a historic moment,” confirmed Caroline Broulet, director of national policies at Canada’s Climate Action Network. Present in Sharm el-Sheikh, Mme Broulet recalled that developing countries have been asking for such a fund for years to help them deal with the consequences of climate change.
The tabled proposal proposes to establish “new financing arrangements to assist developing countries” to “mobilize new and additional resources”. This would make possible the “creation of a loss and damage response fund” whose operation and financing should be developed by a “transition committee” at the next COP28 in the United Arab Emirates in 2023.
It should be remembered that rich countries have been very reluctant about the idea of such financing for years, but the European Union made a statement on Thursday by agreeing to the principle of a “loss and loss response fund”. More vulnerable to an “expanded contributor base,” it pointed to China, which has become significantly richer in 30 years.
If the agreement is confirmed, it will somehow save these 27e The meeting on climate was declared a failure until Saturday morning. “No agreement is better than a bad deal”, European Commission Vice President Frans Timmermans also pointed out to the media.
Photo by Peter DeJong, Associated Press
“We are concerned about some of the things we have seen and heard in the last 12 hours,” Commission Vice President Frans Timmermans told reporters.
“We are concerned about some of the things we have seen and heard in the last 12 hours,” he said, recalling that the Europeans’ objective 1 is “alive”, keeping the warming limit of the most ambitious target of 5°C. Paris Agreement.
The final text proposal presented on Friday reiterates the goals of the 2015 Paris Agreement, which aims to limit global warming to “below 2°C” and, if possible, to 1, 5 degrees compared to the pre-industrial era.
The text emphasizes that the impact of climate change will be negligible at 1.5°C and shows the importance of continuing “efforts” to respect this limit.
However, to achieve this, the world must reduce its GHG emissions by 45% by 2030. According to the latest official estimates, they should grow by 10% by the end of the decade.
“We need an agreement on 1.5°C. We need a strong text on mitigation measures [réduction des émissions] And we’re going to push for that,” Ireland’s environment minister and EU negotiator Eamon Ryan said on Saturday.
Thursday, CO concentration2 The atmosphere increased by 2.35 ppm per year to peak at 417.37 parts per million (ppm). According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), it should not exceed 350 ppm to limit global warming to 1.5°C compared to the pre-industrial era.
Current commitments by various countries are far from meeting the 1.5°C target. According to UN analyses, they would at best limit warming to 2.4°C by the end of the century, putting humanity at risk of reaching irreversible tipping points and causing an uncontrolled runway of climate change.
With Agence France-Presse
