UK PM Boris calls on wealthy countries to meet US$100billion climate pledge
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has urged leaders of the world’s major economies to deliver on their commitment to provide US$100 billion (FJ$210 billion) per year in climate finance.
With just five weeks to go before the COP26 climate summit hosted by the UK in Glasgow, Prime Minister Johnson and UN SecretaryGeneral Antonio Guterres chaired a roundtable meeting of world leaders on climate change in New York on 20 September to address major gaps on emissions targets and climate finance.
The Prime Minister told fellow leaders that more funding has to be provided to help developing countries adapt to and mitigate climate change and transition to net zero emissions.
“Too many major economies – some represented here today, some absent - are lagging too far behind,” PM Johnson said.
“In coming together to agree the US$100 billion pledge, the world’s richest countries made an historic commitment to the world’s poorest – we now owe it to them to deliver on that. I’ll stress that again – for this to be a success we need developed countries to find that US$100 billion”
The closed-door meeting during the annual high-level week of the U.N. General Assembly included leaders and representatives from a more than twenty countries representing industrialized nations, emerging economies and vulnerable developing countries.
PM BAINIMARAMA
Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama was among the international leaders who took part in the meeting. Fiji’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Dr Satyendra Prasad highlighted that science tells us the world’s largest emitters are not doing enough to cut emissions or fill the deepening void in finance to help vulnerable nations build resilience.
“Fiji is proud to stand with the UN and with future generations in demanding that all nations --particularly the largest emitters -- follow our lead by committing to drastic cuts in emissions by 2030 that set us towards net-zero emissions sooner than 2050,” he said.
MARSHALL ISLANDS
David Kabua, the President of the Marshall Islands, who represented the High Ambition Coalition at the roundtable discussions, presented a very strong warning.
“With so much at stake, we have to follow talk with action,” he said, urging the G20 leaders to take drastic steps to cut emissions.
So far major economies remain significantly off track on their emission reduction goals and climate finance commitments. An analysis of country pledges, known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), released by the United Nations earlier this month showed global emissions would be 16 per cent higher in 2030 than they were in 2010 – far from the 45 per cent reduction by 2030 that scientists say is needed to stave off disastrous climate change.
Ahead of the Paris Agreement developed countries committed to mobilise US$100 billion a year from 2020 to support developing countries cut their carbon emissions, minimise the impact of climate change and adapt their economies to deal with its impact.
While international support for tackling climate change has increased hugely since 2015, developed countries have collectively failed to reach the US$100 billion target – last week the OECD confirmed that only US$79.6 billion was mobilised in 2019.
However there has been some recent progress.
SOME PROGRESS
All G7 countries have committed to enhance contributions in the next five years, including scaling up finance for adaptation and nature.
At the G7 Summit in June, new pledges amounting to US$4 billion per year in additional finance were made by major economies.
This week at the UN, US President Biden announced that the US will double its international climate finance to US$11.4 billion per year. China’s President Xi Jinping announced that China would build no new coal-fired power projects overseas, an important step towards bringing an end to the use of coal, the most polluting of all fossil fuels.