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Avantika Goswami and Thobani K on Climate Finance · TIPS Podcast

• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: In today's episode, we look at the topic of climate finance.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I have a guest from India.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: She works for the Center for Science and Environment.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: She's authored a report called Beyond Climate Finance, where she argues increasing financial flows is not enough for the vulnerable global south, saying systematic reforms are required.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Now, according to TIP's work, climate finance is essential to enabling a just transition away from coal towards renewables.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: But current flows are insufficient and they are not always well aligned with inclusion.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: For climate finance to be effective, it needs to be locally embedded.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: That speaks to community ownership and local benefits.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: It needs to be transparent, participatory, and integrated with social policy, jobs, skills, transition support.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: You can find lots of publications on our TIPS website that speak to this topic.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: Without further ado, let's go to the podcast.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: Alright, wonderful.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: What does your organization that you work for really do, essentially?
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: So CSE is a 45-year-old organization focused on environmental and climate research-based advocacy.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: We work primarily in India, but also on the continent of Africa, parts of Southeast Asia, and also in neighboring countries near India, where essentially we take a global south lens to investigating, analyzing environmental issues and disseminating it widely to then also create multipliers in society for positive developmentalist action on environment and climate.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: Have you made any milestones or achievements in Africa?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: So CSE does work with African governments at the national level as well as the sub-national level, with state governments, with municipalities, urban local bodies to address various environmental questions around industrial pollution, water management, waste management, and related environmental fields.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: And it's really a great learning from our work in Africa to understand bottom-up innovative solutions that countries of the global south are producing to tackle various environmental challenges.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: I see.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: So my next question is: what is the role of the global south in shaping the climate and development narrative?
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, the countries of the developing world, or loosely termed as the global south, have a very low historic contribution to the climate problem.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: They have emitted a minuscule portion of the cumulative greenhouse gas emissions that are causing the climate crisis today.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: So they are essentially climate victims because today they are facing the worst brunt of climate impacts despite contributing very little to the problem.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: Coupled with facing climate impacts, they also have massive developmental challenges.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: So improving prosperity, improving goals on nutrition, health, public infrastructure, education, and also the goal of industrialization, which is an aspiration for many developing countries to advance on their structural transformation journey.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: Now, in the past 30 plus years of the climate governance regime, there has been many shifting narratives on how developing countries should be not taking the lead on climate action, that responsibility is on developed countries.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: But developing countries need to take action on climate change in their own best interests.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: But for this, they must receive support in the form of financing, technology, transfer, capacity building from countries of the global north to enable their transition.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: And this support has not really materialized within the climate regime that we have seen so far.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: It has caused a lot of tensions and mistrust also in global climate cooperation.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: And today we are facing a situation where the world is in a very turbulent geopolitical state.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: So not only is the climate problem becoming worse, becoming more intense, but you also have an atmosphere of mistrust on multilateralism.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: Developed countries who have not only caused most of historical emissions, they are also breaking global contracts around the rules of the multilateral trading regime and the ongoing inadequate provision of finance and international cooperation.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: So it is a very complex moment right now.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: And this is where I think there is an opportunity to really examine what role the global south will continue to play.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: So, yes, we do need to reduce emissions.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, we also need to grow, develop, improve energy access.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: How can we do this in the lowest possible low-carbon pathways, avoiding the high carbon pathways that the global north has followed?
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: This is really our challenge at the moment.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: And what I would say is that countries of the South should really leverage and capitalize on this moment of turbulence to kind of frame a new climate and development agenda for themselves.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_01: So if you look at the actual performance of many countries of the global south, let's take the example of the BRICS countries, which today comprise 10 member countries.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: And these 10 member countries constitute 48% of the world's population.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: Many of them are fossil fuel producers.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: Most of them are dependent on fossil fuels for their energy systems, their industry, for their transport systems.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: However, at the same time, BRICS countries are also showing green ambitions.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: So today, 51% of solar power in the world is generated from BRICS countries.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: Three of the top five solar countries in the world are BRICS countries: Brazil, India, and China.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: If you think about green industrial strategies, which this convening here in Johannesburg is about, many of the BRICS countries are showing aspirations to grow clean technology manufacturing from Brazil's efforts to grow electric vehicle manufacturing domestically, India's efforts to produce solar panels and batteries and electric buses, and of course China's massive push to produce all of the climate goods really required.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: So I think this is what I'm characterizing as a new complex green agency of developing countries, where yes, fossil fuels remain incumbent in their energy systems, but at the same time, they have green aspirations and they are also forging green partnerships with one another among countries of the South.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: So, how can we use this complex reality to frame our own narrative on climate and development as countries of the South, where we account for various geopolitical factors and phenomena such as the need for delinking from the US dollar and also acknowledging the role of multipolarity and how that is reshaping the current world order?
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_01: How can we use this moment to rewrite global trade rules and actually reform the global financial architecture?
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: And how can we actually also think about localization, moving up value chains and regional cooperation to not only serve our domestic aspirations better, but also insulate ourselves from the kind of volatility of policy making that the global north is showing right now?
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: So I think this is a really interesting moment, and countries of the South should unite, show solidarity with one another, and forge this new agenda for themselves.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a perfect time to delink and unite as the global south.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, definitely.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: Who would you say has power or is driving the green regulations or the green transition if we are in a situation whereby we feel like these countries are victims, though?
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um non-developing countries?
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, developing countries, yes.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: So definitely we are seeing that China is a leader.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: It is currently responsible for 74% of all wind and solar construction that is going on at the moment.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: And you have some larger emerging economies like India and Brazil also trying to build up renewable energy capacity, make some efforts to decarbonize transport within their own capacities.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: I think a lot of the global south still needs a lot of support, both in terms of financing and technology transfer, to actually make this transition happen at scale for them whilst not sacrificing their developmental goals.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: So how can the global south access finance and technology for the transition?
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's a million-dollar question at this point, and it should be a trillion-dollar question because that was the demand for climate finance put forth last year by the group of 77, the biggest block of developing countries, and UN FCC last year at COP29 and Baku.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_01: And there was a demand to put$1 to$1.3 trillion of climate finance on the table from developed countries, out of which there was a demand for$500 to$600 billion of public finance from developed country governments.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: We did not win this.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: We won a larger goal of$1.3 trillion, which is supposed to come from various sources, including the private sector.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: And within that, nested was a sub-goal of$300 billion, again, to come from various mixed sources, but with the caviars that developed countries should take the lead in providing that$300 billion per year.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: So this process was in the works for many years, almost a decade since the Paris Agreement was signed in 2015.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: And the final outcome was tremendously disappointing to developing countries because$300 billion from a mix of sources, many of which don't have accountability and transparency, really leaves us in the lurch in terms of being able to finance our transition.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: On top of that, what you're seeing this year are a complete retreat from international aid, so overseas development assistance commitments are being cut massively by developed countries.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: And you're also seeing the imposition, of course, of tariffs by currently the US government, but also the imposition of unilateral trade measures like the European Union's carbon border adjustment mechanism, which imposes costs on developing countries and places the burden of the cost of decarbonization directly on them.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: So financing remains a huge challenge, and I think that is a fight that civil society has to rethink very creatively, use their imagination for how to redraw the narrative in line with the very turbulent geopolitics of the moment where there's very little appetite for international cooperation from developed countries.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: I see.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: Alright, my last question to you will be from your perspective, what role should civil society play in advancing this agenda for the global south?
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: So, civil society, I think, first of all, we must really focus on building global solidarity in this moment.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: I think if you take the example just as a proxy of the BRICS grouping, there is a lot of discussion on the differences among the BRICS and the mistrust among BRICS and how they don't really cooperate and coordinate with one another.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of these are products of a wider geopolitical system and history that doesn't need to remain static.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: So if civil society should play a role in amplifying the common struggles and the common aspirations and the common agenda that countries like BRICS and other developing countries have in this moment.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: So rather than focusing on what divides us, we need to amplify what unites us and work towards this progressive common southern agenda for climate and development.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_01: I think this is going to be very important.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: And embedded within that is going to be a set of demands around many of the big systemic issues, be it the upgrading of the trade regime to respond to a climate-just world, be it transforming the global financial architecture to better serve the needs of the global south, also thinking about what reindustrialization pathways can look like for developing countries and meeting our climate targets in this entire process.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: So I think this is something civil society should take on as a very specific project.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: There have been many moments in history, right from the post-colonial period where global south cohesion has actually led to significant moments of political change.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: So if you think about the Bandun Conference of 1955, when newly decolonized freed nations, their leaders came together in a moment of recognition that colonization is a great evil, or various moments of mobilization of developing countries at the WTO, the developing countries raising their agenda to enshrine CBDR during the formation of the UNFCCC in 1992, and then the G77 coming together in 2022 at COP27 to demand the establishment of a loss and damage fund.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: I think these moments have been very instructive that we can, if we unite as one, our voice is loud enough, we have that representation and power to really demand the kind of changes we need in global systems and global governance that suit our best context.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: And this is very urgent to be done in the context of climate development and re-industrialization.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much, Avantaka.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have any last words before we leave?
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh no, thank you.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: This is that's it, and thank you for having me on this podcast.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: Pleasure.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: All right, goodbye.