Dozens of world leaders and climate activists wrapped up a Paris summit grasping at new financial solutions for protecting the planet and eliminating poverty.
The central theme of the two-day Summit for a New Global Financial Pact that ended on Friday was how to unleash trillions of dollars for developing nations to fight the climate crisis.
It was not meant to make formal decisions, but French President Emmanuel Macron had hoped to use it as a platform to launch a tax on carbon pollution from international shipping – about 2.9% of total greenhouse gas emissions – that the International Maritime Organization could adopt next month and raise US$100 billion a year for climate action. No such deal materialized.
Macron, however, emphasized the need to overhaul the global financial architecture that includes the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and other major development institutions.
"We can make it work much better if this money and these liquidities were at the service of progress on the planet and tackling this double challenge that I mentioned: poverty and climate change, biodiversity," he said.
Bringing about a "public finance shock" that shakes up these institutions plus private investment would decarbonize the economy, said Macron. "Policymakers and countries shouldn't ever have to choose between reducing poverty and protecting the planet."
U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres emphasized there can be "no serious solution" without tweaking the global financial architecture. He proposed spending US$500 billion a year as stimulus for sustainable development and climate action.
"I have no illusions. This is a question of power and political will, and change will not happen overnight," he said. "But solutions are not impossible. And we can start now."
Beyond a carbon tax on shipping, Guterres has repeatedly urged wealthy countries to tax the windfall profits of oil, gas and coal producers to help countries struggling to cope with the climate crisis and people cannot afford rising food and energy prices.
Speaker after speaker at the Paris summit blamed the world's major economies, particularly China, Europe and the United States, for a system that puts profits over care for the planet.
'Window of opportunity' is closing
Among the leaders drawn to the summit were German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Chinese Prime Minister Li Qiang and Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
Others participating included U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, U.S. climate envoy John Kerry, IMF President Kristalina Georgieva, World Bank President Ajay Banga and European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde.
They hoped to create momentum ahead of the next major U.N. climate summit, COP28. Nations are dangerously lagging on their legal obligations under the 2015 Paris Agreement, which committed the world to an upper limit of 2° average temperature rise, and, preferably, no more than a 1.5° increase.
In April, the World Meteorological Organization reported the 2022 global mean temperature, which combines near-surface temperature measurements over land and ocean, already was 1.15° above the 1850 to 1900 pre-industrial average.
"The window of opportunity to achieve the Paris climate goals is closing before our eyes. We must do all we can to reach them," Lagarde said.
In 2009, delegates to the U.N. climate summit at Copenhagen promised rich nations would provide US$100 billion a year in climate aid for developing nations, but the pledge was never fulfilled – and has been a bone of contention ever since.
However, the IMF has reached its 2021 target of making US$100 billion in unused special drawing rights, or SDRs – a form of international reserve currency – available for vulnerable countries, Georgieva announced.
Senegal's President Macky Sall announced Canada and European nations would mobilize 2.5 billion euros to help the West African nation curb its fossil fuels use.
The World Bank said earlier this year it would increase lending by US$50 billion over the next decade to fight extreme poverty and climate change.
At its opening, the Paris summit also held a moment of silence at the request of Ugandan climate activist and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Vanessa Nakate.
She urged participants to think about all those who are "suffering, starving, being displaced, dropping out of school, being forced into child marriages, losing their cultures and history, those who are already helpless, hopeless and dying due to the devastating impact of the climate crisis.”
This story has been updated with additional details.
