With increasing concerns about the global climate and economic crisis, world leaders have once again gathered to join hands and discuss appropriate measures to improve the global financial and environmental situation.
The first round of negotiations for a global financial agreement will start in Paris the following week to provide poor nations with access to funds to combat the climate crisis and build socially just and environmentally sustainable economies.
French President Emmanuel Macron, will discuss climate finance, green growth, the debt crisis, and how to access private sector sources of investment with a number of other world leaders on Thursday. According to The Guardian, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has not yet confirmed whether he will attend, but other EU leaders like German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will be present.
Macron criticises current development finance systems, including climate finance, for their ineffective results in reducing emissions and weather impacts.
“The fight against poverty, the decarbonisation of our economy in order to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, and the protection of biodiversity are closely intertwined,” he said, setting out the terms for the two-day summit.
Macron added that the leaders attending the summit will agree on effective solutions for addressing challenges in developing countries’ poor and emerging countries, including investment, infrastructure reform, and establishing a new process.
Additionally, Barbados prime minister Mia Mottley’s Bridgetown agenda aims to expand funding for developing countries, particularly those affected by the climate crisis.
She criticised the World Bank and IMF, calling for a fundamental overhaul to tackle the crisis and alleviate poverty.
Many countries, including the US, EU, and UK, are calling for an overhaul of the World Bank. Former president David Malpass resigned due to his climate-sceptic views. Ajay Banga, a former Citigate banker and Mastercard CEO, is expected to open the institution to private investors and change its climate stance. Banga’s agreement on the overhaul is uncertain, but it could involve $1 trillion of investment in poorer countries, $3 trillion for climate finance, debt relief for indebted nations, and long-term finance for climate resilience.
Patrick Verkooijen, CEO of the Global Center on Adaptation, calls for fundamental change in development finance systems to address global crises like poverty, climate change, food supply, and biodiversity.
He suggests suspending debt service repayment during natural disasters and using multilateral banks’ balance sheets to leverage private sector finance for climate resilience.
According to Alvaro Lario, the president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development, global food shortages and the climate crisis demand urgent attention to address hunger.
He said: “This summit offers an overdue opportunity to revisit the rules of international finance, which are stacked against the world’s poor, and which ignore their enormous contribution to global food security and global stability. It must find a way to catalyse private sector investment on a massive scale. Public funding alone cannot provide the $330 billion needed to eradicate hunger by 2030.”