COP 25 Ends Without Concrete Outcome

• 16 Dec 2019

Why in News

The 25^th edition of the Conference of the Parties (COP25) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) ended without any outcome on the creation of a system of credits for reduction of emissions for the second year in a row.

• Earlier, COP24 at Katowice (Poland) 2019 also couldn’t decide on issues like the creation of new carbon markets, emission reduction targets, etc.
• This was the longest climate COP meeting ever in 25 nearly annual editions.

Key Points

• "Chile-Madrid Time for Action" declaration:
  
  • The summit passed the declaration calling on countries to improve their current pledges to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
  • It also endorsed to help poor countries that are suffering the effects of climate change, although any new funds were not allocated for the purpose.
  • It called on the “urgent need” to cut planet-heating greenhouse gases in line with the goals of the 2015 Paris climate change accord.
    
    • The Paris Accord established the common goal of avoiding a temperature increase of more than 1.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the century.
    • So far, the world is on course for a 3 to 4 degree Celsius rise, with potentially dramatic consequences for many countries, including rising sea levels and fiercer storms.
• Disagreements:
  
  • The Summit couldn’t reach a final agreement on Carbon markets.
    
    • Carbon markets allow for buying and selling of carbon emissions with the objective of reducing global emissions.
  • On the definition and composition of Climate finances.
    
    • Climate finances refer to local, national or transnational financing—drawn from public, private and alternative sources of financing to support mitigation and adaptation actions that will address climate change.
  • The voluntary commitments to be made by nations towards emission reductions.
  • The key polluting countries responsible for 80% of the world’s emissions did not make any substantial announcement while smaller countries announced their targets to reduce emissions in the coming years.
    
    • It backtracks on a principle of the 1992 convention of the Earth Summit (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) that states that rich countries have the biggest historical responsibility for emissions and should pay to help the poor to fix the problem.
• The next Climate Summit will be held in Glasgow (Scotland) in 2020 which will decide about the liability for damages caused by rising temperatures.

Source: TH