COP presidency has been following a common practice of pushing decisions for endorsement by parties at the eleventh hour since the COP15, allowing little space for final effective negotiation from the developing countries
Experts and stakeholders in an event in Dhaka have blamed neoliberal policy for the failure in obtaining the highest pledges for climate justice at the latest edition of the UN climate summit held in Baku, Azerbaijan.
COP presidency has been following a common practice of pushing decisions for endorsement by parties at the eleventh hour since the COP15 in 2009, allowing little space for final effective negotiation from the developing countries, said Md Shamsuddoha, chief executive of the Center for Participatory Research and Development (CPRD)
“This clearly indicates a colonial mindset of the developed countries to forcibly impose their own models on the weaker nations with no remarkable protests from the latter,” he said.
According to him, COP29 decision texts, particularly, on NCQG have also been finalised in a similar fashion disregarding the voices of the Global South.
He was addressing a press conference titled “COP 29 Outcomes: North-Persuaded Neoliberal Policy Instruments Failed the Climate Justice” organised by Climate Justice Alliance, Bangladesh, a platform of 42 civil society organisations (CSOs) and development partners, at National Press Club, Dhaka on Wednesday.
This program aimed at depicting the scenario of achievements drawn from the recently concluded COP 29 against expectations from it. During the press event, the speakers critically discussed key achievements of COP 29.
They highlighted the adoption of the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) with an increased rate of $300 billion annually by 2035, along with an ambiguous aspiration of reaching $1.3 trillion.
What’s more, after ten years of discussions, COP29 has finally agreed on rules of carbon trading under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, which makes the carbon market fully operational.
The regulations regarding international carbon trading under Article 6.2 and a centralized carbon market under Article 6.4 have now been finalized, however, they are flawed by issues with accountability mechanism and significant complexity.
COP29 also decided to launch the ‘Baku Adaptation Roadmap’ and ‘Baku High Level Dialogue’ aiming at advancing the progress of the ‘Paris Agreement’ and supporting the implementation UAE framework to meet the GGA.
While presenting the keynote speaker Md Shamsuddoha said, “The NCQG target of $300 billion by 2035 is too low compared to the needs, and the horizon of meeting the target is too far; there is no clarity on instruments— grants or loan, lack of clarity on sources; it involves all actors to achieve 1.3T target by 2035 without placing sole responsibility on developed countries.
“The finance decision aims to promote the private sector as a major contributor to climate finance, which risks profit-oriented instruments, predominantly loans and other neoliberal financial instruments, be extensively used to meet the goal and failing climate justice thereby.”
He further pointed, “The COP29 underscored and encouraged creating fiscal space in developing country Parties through the use of innovative instruments, such as first-loss instruments, guarantees, local currency financing and foreign exchange risk instruments, which indicates a clear motive of the developed countries to embed neoliberal instruments in the climate finance regime, which directly contravenes climate justice.”
He also said, “Nations could not reach an agreement on how to move forward with the conclusions of last year’s ‘global stocktake’, intended to transition away from fossil fuels. However, they passed forward the decision to COP30 in Brazil next year, though it required immediate finalisation to ensure alignment with the 1.5°C goal.”
Md Ziaul Haque, director, Air Quality Management, Department of Environment, Bangladesh, said “COP29 was expected to ensure MWP provide guidance on 1.5 degrees Celsius- aligned NDC-3, the draft decision did not even refer to the 1.5-degrees Celsius goal; it missed the chance to send high-level messages on the NDC update process.
He also said that while COP29 finalised the standards for centralised carbon market but no accountability mechanism has been directed from COP29.”
He also mentioned that the government is trying to unify our common position on climate negotiations in Bangladesh with CSOs, NGOs, academicians, and other sector stakeholders. He thanked CPRD and its Alliance for playing an active role in strengthening the collective voice for climate justice.
Dr. Suborna Barua, professor at University of Dhaka, criticized the loophole game by the developed countries with regard to climate finance.
“The section 8(c) of the NCQG text has given formality to the financial flows through MDBs, significantly eroding the space for the developing countries to argue for grants-based climate finance in the future COPs”, he added.
Manish Kumar Agrawal, country director at Concern Worldwide said, “The COP29 decision on setting indicators for ‘enabling factors for implementing adaptation action, including the MOI’, created a room for developed countries to impose conditions of transparency and governance against adaptation finance demand from the developing countries, which may ultimately hamper the real progress in adaptation.”
Shamsuddin Illius, bureau chief (Chittagong), The Business Standard, also addressed the event moderated by Shamsuddoha.
A joint presentation of the COP29 outcomes was delivered by CPRD Assistant Manager Sheikh Nur Ataya Rabbi and Research Officer Shanjia Shams at the event.
