By Slashing Emissions And Paying Up On Climate FinancePhoto: UNFCCC Amira Grotendiek
Bonn, 14 June 2024:- As the UN Climate Change Conference (SB60) comes to a close in Bonn without significant progress, and the G7 kicks off
in Italy, the Global Climate and Health Alliance called on developed countries to rapidly reduce emissions and to
deliver on climate finance - such as the reallocation of fossil fuel subsidies to climate finance - in order to protect
people from the worst impacts of climate change. Meanwhile, tens of people migrating from Sudan to Egypt have been killed by extreme heat in the past days, and hundreds in India since March.
Progress stalled in Bonn, with some countries deliberately avoiding discussions on ending fossil fuel use, undermining
progress made at COP28, despite efforts by others to advance action. With just six months until a decision must be
reached during COP29 in Baku, governments also failed to make substantial headway on agreeing a new goal for climate
finance, with major questions of quantity, source, allocation (to mitigation, adaptation, or also loss and damage) and
nature of funding (e.g., grants or loans) left unresolved. The COP29 presidency doubled back on an earlier proposal to tax fossil fuels as a way to raise additional funding to assist countries most impacted by climate change (albeit with fossil-fuel
producing nations as fund shareholders), with Azerbaijan’s chief negotiator later stating that “we cannot single out any
particular part of the industry [from other industries]”. Yet fossil fuel companies have made record profits in recent years, while health systems buckle under the growing strain of the impacts of heatwaves, storms, and disease
on people’s health.
“During this month’s Bonn Climate Conference, governments could have accelerated a response to the “transition away from
fossil fuels” signaled during COP28, but instead spent two weeks kicking the can down the road without agreeing on any decision on mitigation at all, with
some countries directly obstructing useful discourse to protect human health and wellbeing”, said Dr Jeni Miller, Executive Director of the Global Climate and Health Alliance. “With COP29 just months away, developed countries, including the G7, must act to protect people’s health from the
climate crisis, by rapidly reducing emissions and delivering on climate finance, including shifting fossil fuel
subsidies to ensure finance to support all countries so they can adapt, respond and transition in the climate era.”
“While we wait for governments to get their act together, communities in every country around the world are paying the
price with their health, their lives, their children’s futures, with low income, developing countries are suffering the
most”, said Miller. “Meanwhile, governments continue to spend trillions subsidizing fossil fuels - there is enough finance, it’s just
being spent immorally, and in the most harmful places.”
During SB 60, negotiators from climate-vulnerable nations spoke compellingly about the health costs of climate change
during their interventions - including mental health, drug and alcohol problems after displacement and relocation,
malaria, sexual and reproductive health, fatalities from floods and landslides, and damage to healthcare infrastructure
- as well as the need for intersectoral collaboration with ministries of health to address this.
Kenya on behalf of African countries underscored how repayment of debt is costing more than healthcare and education,
and the need for climate finance arrangements to guard against perpetuating these cycles. But progress made has been
wholly insufficient to address these challenges.
“Climate finance that is based heavily on loans exacerbates cycles of debt, poverty and ill-health”, explained Jess Beagley, Global Climate and Health Alliance Policy Lead.
One area where progress was made was on agreeing a way forward to identify metrics for adaptation, including the extent
to which adaptation measures are serving human health and well-being. In addition, high emitting countries including
Australia and the EU spoke of the opportunities of health co-benefits offered by just transitions.
“Over the next six months countries will be updating their Nationally Determined Contributions, the NDCs, which are
their national climate plans and commitments as part of the Paris Agreement”, said Beagley. “This is a key opportunity for national governments to step up and protect their populations, by developing credible
plans for adapting to climate change in ways that protect health, across sectors; reducing air pollution by phasing out
polluting use of fossil fuels including oil, gas, and coal; reflecting the health costs and consequences of inaction in
their financial calculus for progress on climate change; and committing to delivering a better future for their people
by bringing, health, environment, energy, education, transportation, water, agriculture, and other sectors to work
together for holistic, long-term, transformative solutions.”
“Developed countries have a responsibility to ramp up their emission reductions in their new NDCs in line with a rapid
trajectory to phase out fossil fuels. We urge health ministries to be at the NDC decision making tables, to ensure
decisions are being made with their citizens’ health in mind”, said Beagley. “For developing countries, the NDCs are
also an opportunity to clearly articulate what they can do within their own resources, and what they are ready, willing, and able to do if the countries and companies most responsible for climate change provide the funding and resources needed”, Beagley concluded.