A proposal from the presidency, drawn up on Saturday and which must still be approved, contains a compromise on the crucial stake of the conference: the “losses and damage” file, that is to say the irreversible damage caused by warming.
by Audrey Garric (Charm El-Cheikh (Egypt), Special Envoy)
The World Climate Conference (COP27) seemed to be in its final stretch, Saturday, November 19, one day after its official closure. The morning had weighing the risk of a departure from the 200 countries of the seaside resort of Charm El-Cheikh (Egypt) without finding an agreement. In the early afternoon, the Egyptian presidency of the conference sent decisions and delegations hoped for a plenary session, in the evening, to try to lead to a compromise.
There was a glimmer of hope on the crucial stake of the conference: the file of “losses and damage”, that is to say the irreversible damage caused by global warming (droughts, floods, etc. ). The text of the presidency proposes to create a fund to deal with it, as required by developing countries, the hardest affected by warming when they have contributed to it. A committee made up of thirteen countries in the south and ten from the north should work to make it operational as of COP28 next year. This fund would be abundant by the rich countries, but also by “extending sources of funding”, which opens the door to funding from emerging countries but without particularly targeting China.
The offer was favorably welcomed by the largest group of negotiations, the G77 + China, made up of 134 developing countries. “An agreement has been reached,” a European source said to the France-Presse agency (AFP). For many years, rich countries opposed this idea, fearing that it would open the way to wider compensation requests or to repair trials.
China called to contribute
The European Union had created a thunderclap, late in the evening of Thursday, agreeing to create this fund on several conditions, in particular that it is intended only for the most vulnerable countries (and not for all Developing countries), that it is abundant by other contributors than rich countries (which aims for China in particular) and that it is accompanied by increased commitments in terms of programs reduction.
Because this is the other subject of blocking negotiations: to increase efforts in the fight against climate change, while its impacts strike the whole world. The new document of the presidency, which must still be approved, reaffirms the objectives of the 2015 Paris Agreement, in particular the most ambitious which aims to limit warming to 1.5 ° C compared to the pre -industrial era. He encourages countries that have not yet done so to increase their climatic objectives before COP28. The objectives of the States are in fact currently highly insufficient, since they put the planet on a global warming trajectory of 2.5 ° C at the end of the century.
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