COP30: Peoples’ Summit criticizes countries for lack of action
For the organizations and social movements participating in the Peoples’ Summit in Belém, countries and decision-makers have remained silent or proposed completely ineffective solutions, jeopardizing the goal set in the 2015 Paris Agreement to limit the average global temperature rise to 1.5°C.
The Summit officially opened on Wednesday (Nov. 12) as one of the events of the 30th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30). It brings together approximately 1,300 social movements, networks, and grassroots organizations from around the world. The event runs until November 16 at the Federal University of Pará, on the banks of the Guamá River. The opening speeches expressed support for Palestine and criticized the lack of backing for popular participation in the conferences.
“We decided more than two years ago, when we learned that COP30 would take place in our country - and specifically here in the state of Pará - that, given the challenges posed by the COP, we should build one of the largest uprisings of the working class in our country, mobilizing the working class of the world,” said Ayala Ferreira, a member of the Summit’s organizing committee and of the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement (MST).
“Over 30,000 people are expected to attend the Summit, organized as a concrete response by civil society to what participants describe as the COP’s inertia and lack of commitment. According to the Summit’s leaders, even after 30 editions, the COP has delivered few tangible results and continues to exclude local populations from decision-making.”
Before the opening, hundreds of people marched with flags defending water, opposing mining exploitation, and rejecting the use of fossil fuels. Flags representing riverside communities, landless workers, quilombolas, coconut breakers, people affected by dams, people with disabilities, and women were carried through the university grounds, reflecting the diversity of participants. Palestinian flags also waved in every corner, accompanied by chants of “Free Palestine.”
“From Palestine to the Amazon, crimes against humanity persist, and so does peoples’ resistance. In Palestine, the genocide has been ongoing for two years and has yet to cease. Even after the agreement [signed between Israel and Hamas two months ago], Israel’s crimes continue,” said Palestinian activist Jamal Juma.
Uniting agendas
The program includes debates on territories and food sovereignty, historical reparation and environmental racism, a just energy transition, the fight against fossil fuel extraction, participatory governance, democracy and the internationalism of peoples, just cities and vibrant peripheries, popular feminism, and women’s resistance.
According to the organizers, the goal is to “strengthen grassroots organization and bring together unified agendas - socio-environmental, anti-patriarchal, anti-capitalist, anti-colonialist, anti-racist, and rights-based - while respecting their diversity and specificities, united for a future of good living,” as stated in the Peoples’ Summit manifesto, another act of climate resistance launched by the movement.
Ivan González, a member of the Summit’s organizing committee and of the Trade Union Confederation of the Americas (CSA–TUCA), highlighted the efforts of organizations to take part in the debates and influence the decisions made at the COP.
“This effort we have made to be at the Summit is going well - with great difficulty, but still going well. Especially because ordinary people do not have the means to mobilize millions in funds to influence government decisions, particularly at the COP and other governance spaces,” said González. “We are here because we want to show that the people - or rather, individuals - defend our planet, especially against this capitalism that feeds on bodies, labor, and nature,” he added, expressing solidarity with struggles in Burkina Faso, the Congo, Nepal, Palestine, Latin America, and the Caribbean.
Solutions
One of the main points raised at the Peoples’ Summit is the recognition that decision-making countries have either remained silent or proposed completely ineffective solutions to address the climate crisis. Participants point out that extreme weather events, droughts, floods, landslides, and so-called “false climate solutions” only deepen environmental and climate inequality and injustice, disproportionately affecting the most vulnerable populations.
González recalled that social movements have developed solutions rooted in solidarity to address problems arising from the climate crisis and other challenges. He cited as an example the solidarity kitchens, set up during the COVID-19 pandemic to provide free meals to people in vulnerable situations.
“Solidarity kitchens were a grassroots initiative created by social movements during the pandemic and under the Bolsonaro administration. They have helped build an alliance in defense of agroecology and unite rural, urban, and indigenous movements to think beyond immediate crises. For instance, when an extreme weather event leaves thousands homeless, as happened in Rio Grande do Sul state, it is the emergency solidarity kitchens that emerge as the most immediate popular response,” he stated.
“And we believe it is from this process of building popular action that the answer to confronting the climate crisis we face today will emerge,” he added.
