COP27: Rich nations to finally pay for their sins

NEW DELHI, NOV 21: The rich nations have finally agreed that the poor ones are paying for their sins on the climate front.

In a historic breakthrough at the UN climate summit at Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt the rich nations approved a deal that would create a fund for compensating poor nations that are victims of extreme weather worsened by rich countries’ carbon pollution.

An overall larger agreement still was up in the air because of a fight over emission reduction efforts.

Going into the final session, battle lines were drawn over India’s request to change last year’s agreement that called for a phase-down of unabated coal to include a phase-down of oil and natural gas, two other fossil fuels that produce heat-trapping gases. While European nations and others keep pushing for that language, Saudi Arabia, Russia, and Nigeria have been insistent on keeping it out.

India engaged constructively and actively on the subject of loss and damage, which refers to the destruction caused by climate change-induced disasters, during the course of discussions at COP27.

The decision was approved at the COP27 closing plenary that started around 7:45 AM (India time) after negotiators debated the updated drafts of the deal throughout the night.

The success of the talks hinged on a corpus to address the loss and damage fund, which was proposed by the G77 and China (India is part of this group), least-developed countries and small island states. Vulnerable countries had said that they would not leave COP27 without a loss and damage finance facility.

“History was made today at #COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh as parties agreed to the establishment of a long-awaited loss and damage fund for assisting developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change,” the official Twitter handle of the UN climate summit in Egypt posted.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres said COP27 has taken an important step towards justice.

“I welcome the decision to establish a loss and damage fund and to operationalise it in the coming period. Clearly, this will not be enough, but it is a much-needed political signal to rebuild broken trust,” he tweeted.

The decision establishes a fund for what negotiators call loss and damage. It is a big win for poorer nations which have long called for cash sometimes viewed as reparations because they are often the victims of climate-worsened floods, droughts, heat waves, famines and storms despite having contributed little to the pollution that heats up the globe.

It is also long been called an issue of climate justice.

“This is how a 30-year-old journey of ours has finally, we hope, found fruition today,” said Pakistan Climate Minister Sherry Rehman, who often took the lead for the world’s poorest nations. One-third of her nation was submerged this summer by a devastating flood and she and other officials used the motto: ‘What went on in Pakistan will not stay in Pakistan.’

Maldives Environment Minister Aminath Shauna told the AP on  Saturday, “That means for countries like ours we will have the mosaic of solutions that we have been advocating for.”

Outside experts hailed the decision as historic.

This loss and damage fund will be a lifeline for poor families whose houses are destroyed, farmers whose fields are ruined, and islanders forced from their ancestral homes, said Ani Dasgupta, president of the environmental think tank World Resources Institute, minutes after the early morning approval. This positive outcome from COP27 is an important step toward rebuilding trust with poor countries.

It’s a reflection of what can be done when the poorest nations remain unified, said Alex Scott, a climate diplomacy expert at the think tank E3G.

“I think this is huge to have governments coming together to actually work out at least the first step of … how to deal with the issue of loss and damage, Scott said. But like all climate financials, it is one thing to create a fund, it’s another to get money flowing in and out,” she said.

The developed world still has not kept its 2009 pledge to spend $100 billion a year in other climate aid designed to help poor nations develop green energy and adapt to future warming.

The agreement offers hope to the vulnerable people that they will get help to recover from climate disasters and rebuild their lives, said Harjeet Singh, head of global political strategy at Climate Action Network International.

Loss and damage is a way of both recognizing past harm and compensating for that past harm, said Dartmouth climate scientist Justin Mankin, who calculated dollar amounts for each country’s warming. These harms are scientifically identifiable.”

In many ways we’re talking about reparations, said University of Maryland environmental health and justice professor Sacoby Wilson. It’s an appropriate term to use he said, because the rich northern countries got the benefits of fossil fuels, while the poorer global south gets the damage in floods, droughts, climate refugees and hunger.

The Egyptian presidency, which had been under criticism by all sides, proposed a new loss and damage deal Saturday afternoon and within a couple hours an agreement was struck, but Norway’s negotiator said it was not so much the Egyptians but countries working together. Germany climate envoy Jennifer Morgan and Chilean Environment Minister Maisa Rojas, who shepherded the deal on to the agenda and to the finish line, hugged each other after passage, posed for a photo and said yeah, we made it!”

According to the agreement, the fund would initially draw on contributions from developed countries and other private and public sources such as international financial institutions. While major emerging economies such as China would not initially be required to contribute, that option remains on the table and will be negotiated over the coming years. This is a key demand by the European Union and the United States, who argue that China and other large polluters currently classified as developing countries have the financial clout and responsibility to pay their way.

The fund would be largely aimed at the most vulnerable nations, though there would be room for middle-income countries that are severely battered by climate disasters to get aid.

Bleary-eyed rumpled delegations began to fill the plenary room 4 a.m. local time Sunday without seeing the overarching cover decision.

“We are extremely on overtime. There were some good spirits earlier today. I think more people are more frustrated about the lack of progress,” Norwegian climate change minister Espen Barth Eide told The Associated Press.

He said it came down to getting tougher on fossil fuel emissions and retaining the goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) since pre-industrial times as was agreed in last year’s climate summit in Glasgow.

-PTI