The West’s cop-out on climate won’t do

A United Nations report on climate change released last week has said that governments are not making sufficient progress in cutting down greenhouse gas emissions, though the world might see the emissions peak this decade. The emissions are projected to fall by only 2 per cent below the 2019 levels by 2030 as against the 43 per cent reduction needed to avoid the worst impacts of climate change.

There are other reports and surveys also which show the inadequacy of climate action by countries all over the world. It is not just that required action is not taken, but even promises which have been made by countries are not being implemented. Another report from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has warned that the window of time to stave off climate disasters caused by rising temperatures is shrinking and it will impact the lives and well-being of all people everywhere. 

The report and the warning have come ahead of major climate change negotiations among world leaders at COP28, to be held in Dubai in early December. Climate scientists have maintained that the world has to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial era levels, but it is now expected that it would restricted at least to 2.5 degrees by 2030. To avoid the disastrous consequences of such warming, emissions need to fall 43 per cent by 2030 and by 60 per cent by 2035. It is unrealistic now to expect that these targets will be achieved when very little has been done till now. 

At COP28, all countries, especially the developed western countries, will have to make a stronger time-bound commitment on climate action and implement decisions that demonstrate the commitment. At COP27 last year, the rich nations had agreed to establish a fund to provide pay-outs to developing countries for the ‘loss and damage’ caused by climate-induced extreme weather events. But there was no clarity on the details of implementation.

Recently, there was an agreement that the fund would be based at the World Bank initially for four years, but there is still no clarity on the sources of the fund or even about its size. Developing countries have felt that the proposal for the loss and damage fund, which was considered as an important achievement of COP27, has been diluted and is nowhere near implementation. The UN report underlines the inability of the world to take meaningful action to deal with climate change. Much of this inability is the result of the failure of developed countries to support the developing and poorer countries in their efforts to take action. This will be the problem at the COP28 sessions at Dubai, as it was at earlier COP gatherings.