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With just a day more to go before the scheduled conclusion, the COP26 global climate talks appear to be, as expected, heading towards a failure.
No progress has been made on two crucial aspects – providing of finance to the developing countries for climate action and framing rules for carbon markets – both of which are important to the emerging economies.
Furthermore, the push of the developing world for more funds for adaptation, rather than mitigation, is being stiffly opposed by the United States and the EU. Adaptation refers to measures taken for protection from the consequence of global warming that have already become inevitable, as opposed to mitigation, which are the efforts towards prevention of further warming of the planet. Adaptation is critical for the developing countries, while ‘mitigation’ is more important for the developed countries.
India’s Minister for Environment, Forests and Climate Change, Bhupinder Yadav, has said that climate finance is “not charity” but is the responsibility of, as well as redemption of a promise by, the developed countries.
The US is just saying ‘no’ to demands for doubling of adaptation finance, notes Harjeet Singh of Climate Action Network (CAN).
The developed countries have taken a stand that they are already mobilising climate finance.
Similarly, there is no progress in negotiations on Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, which deals with carbon markets.
While there seems to be no agreement in the offing on the core issues, there are some positives on the periphery. For example, the US and China, the world’s two largest emitters, have issued a joint statement. Though there is nothing new in the statement itself, which is more platitudinous than anything else, the coming together of the two countries, “rather than pointing fingers at each other” as Singh notes, is seen as a positive.
COP26 President Alok Sharma said at a press conference today that while there was co-operation and civility throughout the negotiations, "we are not there yet on most critical issues."
Tellingly, he said: "There is still a lot more work to be done. And COP26 is scheduled to close at the end of tomorrow. So time is running out."
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