Harjeet Singh, global head of political strategy at the Climate Action Network, said: “It is not possible to accept loss and damage as a side issue because this is the reality that millions of people are facing. everyday.
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The success or failure of the United Nations’ flagship climate conference may depend on rich countries providing reparations – a divisive and highly emotional issue seen as a Basic questions about climate justice.
The COP27 climate summit will get underway in Egypt from November 6. The annual meeting of the United Nations Climate Change Conference will see more than 30,000 delegates convened in Red Sea resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh to discuss collective action on the climate emergency.
It comes amid growing calls for wealthy nations to compensate vulnerable nations for climate change as many people find it difficult to live safely on a warming planet.
Compensation payments, sometimes referred to as “loss and damage” payments, are likely to dominate the proceedings at COP27, with diplomats from more than 130 countries expected to press ahead. promote the creation of a financial facility dedicated to loss and damage.
They argued that consensus on the matter was required when Climate impacts become more severe.
Rich countries, though making up the majority history of greenhouse gas emissions, has long opposed the creation of a fund to deal with loss and damage. Many policymakers fear that taking responsibility could trigger a wave of lawsuits by countries on the front lines of the climate emergency.
If we lose the war on the agenda then we can also go home and forget about the rest of the COP because it will be useless in the face of what is happening in the world about Climate Change.
Saleemul Huq
Director of ICCCAD
Saleemul Huq, director of the Bangladesh-based International Center for Climate Change and Development, said he was expecting a “war on the agenda” at the start of COP27 – an outcome he said would crucial to the integrity of the summit.
Financing to address loss and damage is on the interim agenda for the United Nations climate conference. However, policymakers will need to determine whether to include it on the official agenda at the start of the summit.
Huq, a pioneer in loss and damage research and advocacy, said it was concerned that rich countries would once again deny financial support to low- and middle-income countries. vulnerable to the climate crisis.
US climate envoy John Kerry said Washington would not “hinder” the loss and damage talks in Sharm el-Sheikh.
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For example, at COP26 last year, high-income countries blocked the proposal for a loss and damage funding agency, opting instead to engage in a new three-year dialogue to discuss funding discussion. The so-called “Glasgow Dialogue” was harshly criticized as a program without a clear plan or an expected outcome.
Huq said in a webinar hosted by Carbon Brief that the battle to put loss-and-damage funding on the official agenda “will be the big fight to come in Sharm el-Sheikh.”
Huq said: “If we lose the fight on the agenda then we might as well go home and forget about the rest of the COP because that would be futile in the face of what is happening. around the world on climate change.
“It is not beyond the capacity of mitigation and adaptation,” he added. “Loss and damage [funding] is by far the most important issue to be discussed and if the UNFCCC does not do that it will be essentially redundant. “
‘Kneeling test for COP27 success’
The promotion of loss and damage payments differs from climate finance towards mitigation and suitability.
Mitigation refers to efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that are causing global warming, such as switching from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. Meanwhile, adaptation means preparing for the adverse effects of the climate crisis by taking action to mitigate the damage.
These are the two established pillars of climate action. Meanwhile, loss and damage financing is widely recognized as the third pillar of international climate policy.
Anglers on the Sava River in dense fog in Belgrade, Serbia, on Tuesday, November 1, 2022. Smoke spews from antique coal-fired power plants, outdated cars and heating systems. Running on tires and wood is burning both the Balkans literally and economically.
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Speaking two weeks before COP27, US climate envoy John Kerry said Washington would not “hamper“The loss and damage talks in Sharm el-Sheikh. His comments mean that for the first time the US has shown a willingness to discuss compensation at the United Nations climate conference.
Kerry’s openness in the loss and damage funding negotiations marked an abrupt change in tone from just a month earlier. Speaking at a New York Times event on September 20Kerry suggested that the United States would not be willing to compensate countries for the loss and damage they suffered as a result of the climate emergency.
“You tell me governments around the world have trillions of dollars — because that’s the price to pay,” Kerry said. He added that he refused to feel “guilty” because of the climate crisis.
“There’s a lot of time to argue, point fingers, do whatever,” Kerry said. “But the money we need right now needs to adapt, needs to build resilience, needs to use technology that will save the planet.”
A man inspects a devastated field in Ramdaspur village affected by Cyclone Sitrang in Bhola in Barishal, Division, Bangladesh on October 15, 2022.
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Advocates of loss and damage funding argue that it is necessary to account for climate impacts – including hurricanes, floods and wildfires or slow-onset effects such as sea level rise – that countries cannot resist because the risk is inevitable or the countries cannot bear it.
“This is a test of the success of COP27,” said Harjeet Singh, head of global political strategy at the Climate Action Network, which includes more than 1,500 civil society groups.
“It is unacceptable to see loss and damage as a secondary issue because this is the reality that millions of people are facing,” Singh said at the same webinar event. devastating floods in pakistan and Severe drought in the Horn of Africa.
Singh said political mobilization based on loss and damage funding makes COP27 the most important COP ever. “Now we have to make sure it delivers the climate justice we’ve been asking for by creating a new funding system so we can support those facing the emergency. current climate level.”
What is loss and damage?
There is no internationally agreed definition of loss and damage, but it is broadly understood to refer to economic impacts on livelihoods and property, as well as non-economic losses and damages, such as such as loss of life and damage to biodiversity.
Rachel James, climate scientist at the University of Bristol: “I think it means different things to different people, but overall, I would consider this idea as funding to address the impacts of climate change. climate change that cannot be avoided through mitigation and adaptation,” Rachel James, a climate scientist at the University of Bristol, told CNBC by phone.
“That has to do with why it’s important for climate justice because we don’t have the mechanism or the funding to tackle that at the moment – and it’s too late to ignore it. “
James says countries from the Global South will seek reassurance in Egypt that rich nations pledged $100 billion in climate funding in 2009 to help low-income countries reduce climate emergency mitigation and adaptation will be met.
“That’s important because it’s a matter of trust,” James said. “If we can’t even get the adaptation and mitigation funding that was promised then that raises questions about our ability to raise additional funding.”
To date, only one UN member state has committed to providing compensation for the most climate-vulnerable regions. Denmark announced in mid-September that it will support low-income countries with more than 100 million Danish crowns ($13.3 million).
Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, not a member of the UN, announced at the COP26 summit in Glasgow last year, a symbolic £1 million ($1.15 million) investment in an effort to encourage other wealthy countries to follow suit.
Why is it important?
“Loss and damage is happening every day somewhere in the world – and it will continue to happen every day from now on,” ICCCAD’s Huq said, citing damage caused by Hurricane Ian in late September as a recent example.
“Ian is the biggest hurricane that Florida has had to date. But that’s not going to be true next year, they’re going to have a bigger storm next year and they’re going to be even bigger the year after that. , we have now entered the era of human-caused climate change impacts of losses and damages.”
“We need to deal with that – and we are not prepared to do that. Even the richest country in the world, the US, is not prepared for this,” he added.
Paddy McCully, senior analyst at NGO Reclaim Finance, says that while loss and damage funding is more likely to appear prominently at COP27, no one is expecting significant progress.
McCully told CNBC by phone: “Given the current geopolitical situation and the markedly different positions from north and south in terms of losses and damage, I think it will be difficult for countries to achieve a powerful breakthrough”.
“The sign of a successful COP would be at least a consensus on the mechanism to finance loss and damage,” he said. “And I think a moderately successful COP wouldn’t all fall apart from the North-South point of view, and at least you have agreement on further negotiations on setting up a mechanism.”
