Beckoning from Belem: Brazil's Amazon gamble on global climate leadership

As Brazil readies for COP30, global climate ambitions face their sternest test yet; strained finances, fractured politics, and waning trust threaten to derail the fragile momentum built since the Paris Agreement

- ABDULAZIZ KHATTAK

In the shadow of the Amazon rainforest, Belem braces for COP30's arrival in November 2025, where renewed pledges on finance and forests must navigate bureaucratic snarls and policy reversals to salvage COP29's fragile gains amid escalating climate perils.

Brazil is racing to host the 30th United Nations Climate Change Conference, or Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC, more commonly known as COP30, from November 10-21, 2025.

This summit, the first in South America, thrusts the Amazon's beleaguered ecosystems into the global spotlight.

Yet, with construction sites still buzzing and hotel prices soaring, whispers of fiasco echo through diplomatic corridors.

World leaders, scientists, and activists-up to 40,000 strong-will converge on this riverside city, testing multilateralism’s mettle a decade after the Paris Agreement.

Brazil's presidency, under diplomat Andre Correa do Lago, promises innovation: Thematic days linking talks to real-world fixes, from energy transitions to social equity.

Lula da Silva, Brazil's President, has even invited Pope Leo XIV to enforce the idea that the agenda feels heavier than ever.

Last month, the pontiff spoke out against critics of global warming, and said: “Some have chosen to deride the increasingly evident signs of climate change, to ridicule those who speak of global warming, and even to blame the poor for the very thing that affects them the most.”

The Pope's presence could amplify calls for climate justice, echoing his encyclicals on poverty and planetary care.

SCRATCH FOR COP30

The decision to build a new conference centre from scratch for COP30 is steeped in irony.

Constructing a sprawling new facility often involves vast amounts of concrete, steel, and energy-intensive processes, and generates significant greenhouse gas emissions.

It is precisely the kind of environmental impact COP aims to mitigate.