Wasting time, money at COP29

THE EDITOR: The global response to climate change reveals a troubling paradox that deserves public attention and action from Minister of Planning and Development Pennelope Beckles.

The 2024 United Nations Climate Change Conference or Conference of the Parties, more commonly known as COP29 and being held in Azerbaijan, has not only been controversial as a location, but there has been no significant improvements to date to report.

Small Island Developing States (SIDS) like TT, which cumulatively contribute less than one per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, face existential threats from rising seas and extreme weather, while major polluters continue to drag their feet on climate action and financial commitments.

Even more perplexing is the ludicrous expectation that our small nations invest their scarce resources in carbon-reduction initiatives. This defies both logic and justice. Asking countries with negligible emissions to further reduce their carbon footprint while major polluters dawdle and deflect is akin to asking someone who takes one drop from a flowing river to use their limited means to take even less.

These resources would be far better spent on critical adaptation measures to protect our vulnerable populations.

Eight years after the Paris Agreement, developed nations have failed to deliver on their promised US$100 billion annual climate finance to vulnerable nations. Instead of honouring these commitments, we see a pattern of delay and distraction, and demands for ever increasing project justifications.

SIDS representatives are caught in an endless cycle of international meetings, forums, and conferences – a diplomatic merry-go-round that drains our limited resources and diverts attention from holding major polluters accountable.

While our SIDs delegates traverse the world attending countless climate events, our islands face immediate threats from climate change. The cruel irony is that our vulnerable nations are duped into spending precious resources and scarce foreign currency (forex) participating in meetings about a crisis we did not create, rather than implementing vital adaptation measures using the major polluters’ money.

The math is simple: China, the US, and the European Union together account for more than 54 per cent of global emissions. Yet the burden of climate diplomacy falls heavily on the shoulders of small island nations. This isn’t just inefficient – it’s unjust.

Why are they making the smallest contributors to climate change shoulder the heaviest diplomatic burden? Why are they asking us to spend money reducing already minimal emissions instead of protecting their people? Why hasn’t the US$100 billion pledge been met? And, most importantly, how much longer can we expect SIDS to participate in this exhausting diplomatic dance while their very existence hangs in the balance?

It is time to demand real action from major polluters, not more meetings or misplaced mandates. COP summits should henceforth be virtual.

Our minister of planning and development needs to lobby (with our Caricom partners) the UN for equitable climate financing.

FAZIR KHAN

via e-mail

The post Wasting time, money at COP29 appeared first on Trinidad and Tobago Newsday.