Written by Dr Darian McBain, Sustainability Advisor, Elevandi, and Chief Executive Officer, Outsourced Chief Sustainability Officer Asia
If you had no context for climate change negotiations and had landed on Earth from another planet in late November, you could be forgiven for thinking that the way humans plan to solve climate change is by travelling long distances to gather in a city in the desert and take photos of each other. If a picture says 1,000 words, 1,000 selfies don’t produce a solution to climate change.
As COP 28 drew to a close, it seems there was more going on under the surface, and behind the scenes than panels, fireside chats, keynote speeches and product launches. The hardworking negotiators worked their magic and leadership was shown by the President of the Summit, Sultan al-Jaber who, as the head of the national oil company of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), was initially dismissed as a spokesperson for Big Oil. These concerns were amplified when in an interview early on during the COP meetings he questioned the science supporting the phasing out of fossil fuels. However, he has shown the negotiating ability of the Arabic state, bringing the fossil fuel states and companies together to the Climate Summit with the rest of the world like perhaps no other could.
The UAE certainly understands in a very visceral way the impacts of climate change – they already have extreme heat, a lack of access to water and lack of ability to grow sufficient food for their population. With this in mind, as well as the fact that their wealth has to date been derived from fossil fuels, UAE hosted the biggest Conference of the Parties on Climate Change (COP) yet. In a year when 2023 is on track to be the hottest in recorded history, and could be the hottest in more than 100,000 years. Keeping the rise in global temperatures under 2 degrees Celsius, and preferably within 1.5 degrees Celsius of pre-industrial levels of warming, the stated aim of the Paris Declaration made at COP 21 in Paris, is an increasingly urgent imperative. So what did this COP deliver?
What went really well….
One of the first, and potentially most impactful agreements to come out of this COP
The inclusion of the role of nature is an important one, to ensure that we continue to consider the continuum that exists between climate change, nature and people. The UAE Consensus makes specific reference to ‘conserving, protecting and restoring nature and ecosystems’. This will be achieved by halting and reversing deforestation and degradation, conserving biodiversity and terrestrial and marine ecosystems (hooray for the oceans being included) in line with the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. This is an upgrade from the agreement at COP26 in Glasgow on deforestation, which was not part of the UN agreement and supported by 130 countries instead of the full 198 countries who have agreed to the UAE Consensus.
A special shout out goes to reference of Indigenous People’s knowledge and local knowledge systems as well as science, for guiding decisions on implementation.
There are an awful lot of devils in the details that will need to be worked out to implement this agreement and have the impact that we need. We don’t yet know how the rubber will hit the road because there are potentially many loopholes and caveats, and the UAE Consensus does not have a mechanism for enforcement. We don’t have much time, and not only mitigation but adaptation needs to start now. But at least we have an agreed path forward signed by 198 countries and recognition that we need to transition away from fossil fuel use.
What still needs a bit of work…
Not everything reached a conclusion, which is often true of such an intense negotiation process. Notably, the discussions around Article 6 relating to the carbon markets failed to reach an agreement. In a year where several global exposés have called into question the validity and transparency of the voluntary carbon markets, many see this as another blow. Finance, front and centre of COP26, was also put on the backburner with an agreement to look at a post 2025 finance target ahead of the next COP, which will take place in Baku, Azerbaijan.
The biggest point of contention is that we still remain without the language and commitment to stop burning fossil fuels, and that with the impacts of climate change being felt now, the ambitions of this agreement and our collective pace of change is too slow.
Time to get involved
The Singapore Fintech Festival in 2023 had 66,000 people in attendance. That was big. COP 28 had over 100,000 people over two weeks. We can be cynical and say the talk fest doesn’t matter, but it does. Culturally, the COP meetings have become a part of our annual timeline. Someone even wished me recently a Happy COP season and a Prosperous New Year. If we don’t put language to our global challenges like climate change and start to align our culture with a net zero future, we cannot share a common understanding of the solutions that we all need to contribute to at a number of levels. Meeting in person builds trust in a way that meeting virtually can not. And at this time, we need to build trust because climate change needs collective action – just ask the Small Island Developing States, who generally contribute very little to global emissions, and yet will be impacted so dramatically. So whilst large gatherings have an impact of their own, they also bring with them the benefit of sharing knowledge, ideas and building trust.