Guterres: Do not allow historic COP27 agreement to be derailed

03 / 05 / 2023

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• Sustainable Development

United Nations Secretary General António Guterres called for delivering loss-and-damage funding and not to “allow historic COP27 [2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference] agreement to be derailed.

“Remember one simple fact:  addressing loss and damage is about saving lives,” he stressed in his video message to the 2023 Petersberg Climate Dialogue in Berlin .

“We know because the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change tells us that breaching 1.5°C, even temporarily, could be disastrous. Yet, temperatures are set to rise 2.8°C by the end of the century if we maintain the present policies,” he said.

“We know that the 1.5°C limit requires halving global emissions by 2030.  Yet, they are on course to rise 10 percent by then compared to 2010,” he added.

“And we know that a 1.5°C pathway is possible.  Yet, we will only achieve it with a quantum leap in climate action globally,” he said.

“We must be upfront about what this requires:  it requires cooperation — rising above geopolitical divisions; climate justice — developed countries and international financial institutions delivering on long-overdue finance; and cleaning up our economies — breaking our fossil-fuel addiction and driving decarbonization in every sector,” he said.

“I have proposed to the G20 a Climate Solidarity Pact — in which all big emitters make extra efforts to cut emissions, and wealthier countries support emerging economies to be able to do so,” he said.

“And, last month, I presented a plan to super-charge efforts to achieve this through the Acceleration Agenda,” he said.

“This proposes that all countries hit fast-forward on their net-zero deadlines.  It asks developed countries to commit to reaching net-zero as close as possible to 2040, the limit they should all aim to respect, and emerging economies to commit to reaching net-zero as close as possible to 2050 — again, the limit they should all aim to respect,” the un chief said.

This is in line with the principle of common-but-differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in light of different national circumstances, as reaffirmed in Paris.

The Acceleration Agenda urges countries to pool their resources, scientific capacities and technologies.

It calls on developed countries to deliver the $100 billion this year, as pledged in Glasgow; to replenish the Green Climate Fund; and to deliver on their finance commitments on adaptation.

Despite the promise made in Glasgow to double adaptation finance by 2025, parity between adaptation and mitigation finance remains too far off.

“I will welcome first-movers on the Acceleration Agenda to the Climate Ambition Summit I am hosting this September in New York — those with concrete actions and commitments.

And COP28 [2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference], two months later, will see the first global stocktake of the Paris Agreement [on climate change], showing us plainly where we stand in the fight for 1.5°C.

It will also launch the next cycle of national climate plans — or nationally determined contributions — which must reflect the acceleration we need.

“By the end of COP28, I count on all G20 leaders to have committed to ambitious new nationally determined contributions, covering all greenhouse gases and the whole economy, and indicating absolute emissions cuts targets for 2035 and 2040,” he said.