26th April 2016
Developing countries must raise more than $4tn (£2,456bn), or roughly the entire annual budget of the US, to implement their climate change pledges by 2030, according to new research.
But much more money will have to be be found by the world’s poorest countries to hold global temperatures enough to avoid catastrophic climate change, say British and Australian researchers who have analysed the financial implications of the pledges made to the UN last December and the money so far offered by rich countries.
As 170 countries meet on Friday in New York to sign the Paris agreement and potentially set the world on a low-carbon development path from 2020, developing country negotiators called for a reality check, saying there was a vast financial gap between the world’s climate change ambition and the reality of funding the emissions reductions needed to avoid catastrophic warming.
To date, rich countries have only agreed to mobilise $100bn a year for developing countries to act on climate after 2020. They have also pledged $10.3bn to the Green Climate Fund, the UN-backed mechanism that will disburse money for climate change adaptation and mitigation.
“Mobilising trillions of dollars of climate finance, not hundreds of billions, is the new business as usual,” said Seyni Nafo, chair of the African group of 54 countries.
The new analysis, based on earlier work by Carbon Brief, shows that about $4.1tn will be needed to fund the emission cuts of the 70-odd countries that have so far identified how much it will cost them. These countries together emit only about 25% of total developing country emissions.
To read the full article on The Guardian Online click here
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