The news of the last few days have been focused on one thing and one thing only: COP26, it has been the title of newspapers, broadcasts, podcasts, and every other digital-based tool available on the market, making it impossible for the public to ignore what is probably one of the most crucial gatherings in the last decade and that is going to be most certainly determining how great will the impact on our quality of life for the future years to come be, but in order for us to understand how important will this occurrence prove to be, we must understand properly what it is going to revolve around and the consequences that the decisions that will be made during these times will affect us and in which ways too.
What does COP stand for? It means Conference of the Parties, which are the ones that signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, or shortly, UNFCCC, this was a treaty brought to life in 1994 by 197 countries and the EU, in 2021 this conference will be hosted by the United Kingdom and its partner Italy, this is going to be the 26th meeting since its creation, hence the name COP26, this kind of lecturing are among the largest in the world and it goes without saying that the negotiations about such delicate matters are just as long and complicated, to give you context, the Paris Agreement was agreed at COP21 in 2015, it managed to find common ground between almost every country in the world and bound them legally to the commitment of reducing emissions, the latter accordance also set for the world ambitious goals, but most of all it allowed the world to acknowledge the consequences that climate change is going to have, and it’s already having on the earth and on its population.
Although the advent of Covid-19 has put everyone’s life on hold, climate change has continued and perhaps got worse, threatening the possibility of the existence of life on the globe, and this is only one of the reasons why it’s key that we take advantage of all the opportunities we get in order to tackle global warming and at the same time concentrate on building back better, and greener hopefully moving towards a low carbon future as the fact that many countries are already switching to cheaper and cleaner sources of energy such as wind and the solar one shows, a smart move if we want to protect and restore the world’s biodiversity upon which life depends.
COP26 will work on taking forward actions on protecting and restoring forests and critical ecosystems with the aim of building a sustainable and nature positive agriculture in a decisive and concrete way, this will probably be the world’s best chance to runaway climate change under control given the urgency of the matter.
Everything that was agreed in Paris, as monumental as it was, didn’t come close to limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees, 2020 marked the first of the five years cycles, and countries are expected to update their targets for 2030 before the 2021 meeting, which makes the decade in between crucial, signatories of the treaty have to commit to neither opening or financing any new coal-fired power stations across the globe and at the same time work to provide developing countries with clean energy and better system to deliver it to their citizens as well as protecting forests, increase sustainable production and reduce carbon emissions, for this matter COP26 represents an opportunity for the world to take immediate action to allow the remaining natural ecosystem to stay intact and prosper, what better timing then the Covid era to start from scratch and do it better this time?
Moreover, since the UN negotiations are based on consensus, reaching an agreement will mean that everyone’s voice is heard, including the ones of the communities that are suffering the most from this climatic situation.
During the first day of the meeting, the main issues that were addressed were article six with carbon trading, the common timeframes, the adaptation Fund, and Loss and damage alongside Human Rights, afterwards, the World Leader summit happened where multiple heads of State presented their contributions reaching the number of 100 leaders among which there were the ones from Canada, Russia, Colombia, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and some other countries among the ones with the world’s most important carbon sinks, let it be known that Brazil also signed up as it had to deal with the deforestation crisis that affected the Amazon recently, and its president was urged to take concrete steps towards finding a solution and toughen his response.
A highlight coming from the conference would be the apology of the leader of the United States of America Joe Biden for what concerns his predecessor’s decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, “I guess I shouldn’t apologize, but I do apologize for the fact that the United States — the last administration — pulled out of the Paris Accords and put us sort of behind the 8 ball”, he said, the new president seems to be really concerned about climate change as he re-entered the mentioned agreement just a few hours he was sworn into office and, during his speech, he also stated “We will demonstrate to the world that the United States is not only back at the table, but hopefully leading by the power of our example,” showing his commitment to all the presents, additionally, it seems that India is making net-zero promises as its Prime Minister Modi announced that his country will become carbon neutral by 2070, a decade later than China’s and two than the rest of the world, but still, this is to be considered an achievement.
On the other hand, the delegates from smaller nations have expressed once again their disappointment with the lack of action coming from the richest nations which reflects on the less powerful countries that have to face the consequences of the worsening conditions of the climate change situation, on this matter, president Xi Jinping has called upon the developed countries to provide support to the developing ones in order for them to do better, still, he along with Bolsonaro and Putin decided not to attend personally the summit, and this is something that, on day two, Biden noticed and didn’t agree “I think it’s been a big mistake for China, they’ve lost their ability to influence people around the world, and people here at COP.” He claimed “It just is a gigantic issue and they walked away, how do you do that and claim to have any leadership mantle?” concluding with “We showed up,” Mr. Biden said, “And by showing up, we’ve had a profound impact.”.
Consequently, over the next two weeks, negotiators have the tough job of convincing the UN’s 197 countries to commit to sweeping climate pledges in the biggest and most important gathering we’ve seen yet.
References:
COP26 explained, available at:
https://ukcop26.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/COP26-Explained.pdf
What happened at COP26 today, available at:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/01/what-happened-at-cop26-day-one-at-a-glance
Day 2 of the COP26 summit, available at:
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/11/02/world/cop26-glasgow-climate-summit
As it happened, available at:
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-59125188
What’s happening in Glasgow 2021, available at:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/51372486
Insights from COP26, available at:
https://www.ymca.int/cop26-day1-silke/
Takeaways from the first day of COP26, available at:
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/11/01/world/cop26-day-1-takeaways-intl-climate/index.html
By The European Institute for International Law and International Relations.
