21 November
The first NCQG Text for the "New Collective Quantified Goal On Climate Finance" has been published at @COP29 in Baku - at around midnight last night. This is the main business on the agenda here.
Agreeing on this is the overarching goal of #COP29 in Baku - which is also being called a Finance COP. The last three COPs in the UK, Egypt and UAE laid the groundwork for this - but the issues remain very difficult.
An agreement on this is now due under a deadline agreed as part of the Paris Climate Agreement negotiated in Paris in 2015.
COP29 is now in its final days.
It is officially due to end on November 22nd but almost certainly will not do so, as there is not yet even a total number for climate finance on the table - which is one of the the things that Developing Nations are pushing for.
Yesterday there was a press advisory from Climate Action Network suggesting that a number of 600 Billion would be asked for from Developing Nations but when the press conference started this number was not mentioned. The Press conference can be watched here.
More press conferences and protests will take place today in the venue as the deadline for ending the COP approaches. It is fairly normal for COPs to run over into the following Saturday and Sunday,
These texts are difficult to read for the uninitiated but for the strong of will key points to look at in the text include:
- Developed Nations Views PARAS 26-29
- Developing Nations Views PARAS 22-25
- Reform of the Financial Architecture PARAS 52-53 (note this is effectively the post WWII Bretton Woods Architecture which has evolved somewhat since the 1940s but which remains very strongly tilted in favour of Developed Nations)
- Measures to prevent further indebtedness of developing nations PARA 38
A number is broadly considered to be necessary but Developed Nations are objecting that since the UNFCCC Framework Convention on Climate Change came into being in the 1990s many parties to the agreement which were developing nations - most notably Saudi Arabia and China - are no longer developing nations - and are pushing for this to change.
But at a practical level there is no means to force the change that they wish and this is now one of the key blocking points. China's response to this is to say that it is already providing finance directly at large scale to developing nations outside of the UNFCCC framework.
Continuing...