Show me the money: Why climate finance is the true test of global solidarity

LAST WEEK, on the 29th of October 2025, young climate leaders, policymakers, and negotiators gathered at the COP30 Youth Dialogue hosted by the Local Conference of Youth (LCOY) South Africa 2025, supported by the Presidential Climate Commission (PCC) and funded by the European Union.

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The event, themed "Towards a Compact for the Future: Solidarity, Sustainability and Equality," could not have come at a more critical moment.

With South Africa preparing to host the 2025 G20 Leaders' Summit and Brazil (and the rest of the world) gearing up for COP30, the conversation turned to the central issue that has haunted global climate politics for decades: money.

In the 1996 film Jerry Maguire, a desperate sports agent is confronted by his client's now-iconic demand: "Show me the money" The phrase, though simple, captures the heart of what developing nations are now saying to the world's wealthiest economies.

For countries in the Global South, the climate crisis is not an abstract future threat, it is a daily reality eroding livelihoods, stability, and hope.

Yet the funds needed to respond remain out of reach. The moral and material weight of this shortfall is enormous. To meet their national climate plans and adaptation needs, developing nations collectively require between five and seven trillion dollars by 2030. But the flow of climate finance remains painfully insufficient, slow, and inequitable.

At the recent national youth dialogue on COP30, the tension between urgency and slow global action was unmistakable.

The keynote address underscored that the world remains dangerously offtrack from the 1.5℃ goal, while a detailed briefing on South Africa's negotiation priorities provided a clear and sobering picture of what is at stake.