Global Climate Deadlock

Finance shortfalls and geopolitical rifts mar COP29, leaving developing nations disillusioned. India's self-reliance emerges as a key strategy amid faltering global climate commitments and uncertain cooperation

- PRAVEEN GARG & PAWAN JAI SINGH RATHORE

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) convened its 29th Conference of Parties (COP) in Baku, Azerbaijan, from November 11 to 21, 2024. As the foremost platform for shaping international climate policies, the COP brought together 198 countries committed to advancing the goals of the 2015 Paris Agreement. According to Article 2.1 of the Agreement, the global response to climate change hinges on making finance flows consistent with a pathway towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient development.

Financing Climate Action COP29 was called the "finance COP," as it was poised to finalize the much-anticipated "National Collective Quantified Finance Goal" (NCQG). This new target was designed to set financial obligations for developed countries, replacing the outdated $100 billion annual commitment established at COP15 in Copenhagen in 2009. Economist William Nordhaus, the 2018 Nobel Prize laureate, highlighted in his book The Spirit of Green that achieving global climate targets would require an annual investment of $2 trillion to $6 trillion, or approximately 4 to 6 per cent of the world's income. In Baku, developing nations demanded $1.3 trillion annually from developed countries, a figure still below Nordhaus's lowest estimates. Of this amount, it was expected that $440 to $900 billion would take the form of grant-based public funding.