Brazil stresses urgency of funding for climate action
On the first day of debates at the Pre-COP, a preparatory event for the 30th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30) to be held in a month in Belém, the Brazilian delegation highlighted on Monday (Oct. 13) the urgency of financial resources. These resources are essential to achieve mitigation, adaptation, and fair socioeconomic transition goals in the face of global warming.
The Pre-COP continues until Tuesday (14) in Brasília, with negotiators from 67 countries participating, including diplomats, ministers, and other national government officials.
“For decades, we have extracted from nature the resources that drove economic development. Now it is time to reverse this logic: to redirect human, financial, and technological resources to preserve, restore, and sustainably use the natural resources we still have. We need to change before we are changed by the climate emergency,” said Minister of the Environment and Climate Change Marina Silva, opening the Pre-COP segment on Nature and Climate.
Marina Silva highlighted that an estimated $280 billion per year is needed just to protect forests - four times the current funding. According to her, another $16 billion per year is required for ocean conservation.
Finance Minister Fernando Haddad, who chairs the Finance Ministers’ Circle, also highlighted debates on expanding climate finance in developing countries as one of this COP’s priorities, especially regarding the so-called Baku to Belém Roadmap: a political initiative aiming to mobilize $1.3 trillion per year by 2035.
Reforming multilateral banks, increasing investment flows to those in need, and mobilizing the private sector are among the topics under discussion.
Strengthening multilateralism
During the ministerial roundtable, which brought together representatives from various countries, there was strong consensus on the need for multilateral solutions, particularly on adaptation, according to a report by COP30’s designated president, Ambassador André Corrêa do Lago.
“I think there was a clear alignment on the desire to strengthen multilateralism; there is no doubt about that. The issue of adaptation was strongly emphasized - very strongly, in fact. Adaptation by rich countries to small islands and medium-sized countries was a point of general consensus,” he said in an interview with journalists.
To date, 62 of 195 countries have formally submitted their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), representing just 31 percent of global emissions.
Major polluting regions, such as the European Union and India, whose delegations are present at the Pre-COP, have not yet renewed these commitments - originally agreed upon in the Paris Agreement 10 years ago to keep global temperatures from rising more than 1.5°C by the end of the century.
“It is essential that the Pre-COP talks foster greater ambition, adequate climate commitments, and - above all - the necessary financing to enable real progress,” said Gustavo Souza, senior director of Public Policy and Incentives at Conservation International (CI-Brazil).
