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Can COP28 accelerate climate investment in the Global South?
Industrialized countries argue that emerging economies will account for the bulk of future carbon emissions and that the GST should focus on limiting emissions going forward.
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People walk past a stall at the venue of the United Nations climate conference (COP28) in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, on Dec. 1, 2023. (AFP/Ludovic Marin)
T
he 28th edition the United Nations climate conference (COP28) is underway in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates. This summit is another attempt to reach a collective commitment to hold global temperatures to no higher than 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels by the end of the century.
Despite countries unanimously agreeing that humanity will collectively bear a huge price if these temperature limits are breached, previous COPs resulted in a torrent of self-congratulatory words but often failed to unleash concrete action to accelerate climate investment in the Global South, which is home to over 80 percent of the world’s population, including those most vulnerable to climate change.
Three major issues are at the center of COP28’s deliberations: the conclusion of global stocktaking, the operationalization of the Loss and Damage Fund and the bolstering of carbon markets.
The first “Global Stocktake” was a key part of the Paris Agreement machinery and is at the heart of a five-year “ambition cycle”, which consists of reviewing national pledges for climate action, a global assessment of progress and renewed bottom-up Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). By assessing aggregate progress in mitigation, adaptation and support mechanisms of technology transfer and finance, the GST is meant to drive the ratcheting up of national pledges.
Developing and least-developed countries of the Global South argue that the GST must look at past efforts and bring accountability for the failure of many developed countries in the Global North to do what they argue is consistent with equity. Industrialized countries argue that emerging economies will account for the bulk of future carbon emissions and that the GST should focus on limiting emissions going forward.
The outcome of this negotiation in COP28 will shape whether the disproportionate responsibility of developed countries for emissions is adequately reflected in future benchmarks for climate investments in the Global South. For example, one way to recognize responsibility is to expect developed countries to reach net-zero emissions earlier than the Global South.
To give implementation concrete form, COP28 is likely to include language that calls for countries to triple renewable energy and double energy efficiency – ideas that were notably included in the recent Group of 20 Summit Declaration.
