Implications of COVID-19 pandemic on global climate change governance

THE COVID-19 pandemic has proved to be the largest global health crisis ever witnessed in a century. It is also the largest economic crisis in over a decade after the 2008 world economic recession.

The COVID-19 crisis is in resonance with other crises being faced by different nations, with Zimbabwe not being an exception.

One of these crises which corelates with the coronavirus pandemic is climate change, in the sense that both COVID-19 and climate change are immune to national borders and they pose an imminent threat to human civilisation and development.

Climate change’s wrath is evident in the frequent droughts and the tropical cyclones that have battered the earth in recent times, Cyclone Idai being the most recent example.

The impacts of the coronavirus crisis in the form of the global economic halt and broad-based lifestyle changes might have actually brought some positives on the fight against climate change by bringing down greenhouse gas emissions.

This is because the sudden economic halt has provided an opportunity to think afresh on how to tackle the immediate health emergency and the long-term climate crisis through the adoption of sustainable climate friendly, internationally co-ordinated socio-economic policies.

Although the immediate impacts of COVID-19 on the environment might seem good when looking at the historic drop in air pollution levels due to lockdown measures or sights of wildlife returning to places long abandoned by them, the change might fall short of making a meaningful impact on the long-term goal of decarbonisation or adopting a greener lifestyle.

If one is to go by the reports by New York Times which show that the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change through the Paris Agreement targets fall in greenhouse emission by 8% every year between now and 2030 in order to achieve the long-term temperature goal spelt in the Paris Agreement, and in view of this the expected declines due to economic lockdowns fall short of the required targets.

This is because the observed reductions in emissions also come at extreme economic costs which are much to the detriment of the poor and unsustainable for a long period of time.

One of the most significant pillars in the fight against climate change as espoused in the Paris Agreement is increased international co-operation in adopting climate policies.

The impacts of COVID-19 on international co-operation appear to be detrimental than encouraging.

The serious health crisis induced by the pandemic has prompted many leaders across the world to vouch for increased protectionism and self-sufficiency.

The crisis also led to higher suspicions of the motives of rival nations, fortuitously leading to lesser international cooperation.

For example, nations such as India have called for policies such as “Self-dependent India” to come out of the health and economic crisis while the US government has shown its usual disdain for international bodies by withdrawing support to the WHO in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In addition, the Trump administration took advantage of the pandemic to weaken environmental protection laws by acting on the long-held position of being a climate change denier.

Both climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic have halted the world and it is evident they can drastically alter the trajectory of socio-economic policies and bring lifestyle changes.

COVID-19 provides opportunities to reset the priorities of the nations and map a climatefriendly path of development, but at the same time it brings challenges in terms of vested economic and political interests taking off the salve in the new state of affairs.

The time, therefore, seems to be ripe for the world and national governments to embolden the calls for a new climate deal in climate governance.