UN Climate Change Conference to be held in Azerbaijan

KARACHI: The 29th UN Climate Change Conference will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan, in the second and third weeks of November.

In 2015, the Paris Agreement was reached at the COP 21, a landmark in the history of climate change prevention. It pledged to halve global greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 through a transition to renewable energy. By 2050 the goal is to move to zero global emissions by transitioning entirely to renewable energy to limit global temperature rise to preferably 1.5 degrees.

Two years ago, at COP 27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, it was announced that in addition to the regular climate aid fund, an emergency aid fund for climate disaster prevention would be established to help developing and poor countries suffering from climate disasters. This fund has been named as the Loss and Damage Fund. Pakistan and Bangladesh played a key role in its establishment. However, this fund has not been fully operational till now, even though it was discussed a lot at the COP 28 in Dubai.

COP 29 is equally important for Pakistan as for other developing countries because Pakistan is among the countries whose share of greenhouse gas emissions responsible for global warming is less than one percent, while it is number five in the list of countries most affected by climate change. In the floods of 2022, the loss of lives and property in Sindh was around $3 billion, of which Pakistan has not received even a small part because the loss and damage fund has not received more than a few million dollars so far.

Similarly, in terms of climate finance, eight climate adaptation projects have been received by Pakistan so far, worth $25 million, and most of them are not grants, but mostly loans with easy terms.