My reflections on finance and COP29.

I read the Independent High Level Expert Group on Climate Finance report, which said that the minimum concessional public financing needed was $390 billion annually. It also puts developing countries’ need for external climate finance at around $1 trillion a year by 2030 and $1.3 trillion by 2035.

At its core, the agreement in Baku targets developed countries taking the lead on mobilising core financing of at least USD 300 billion annually by 2035 and an 'additional layer' of up to USD 1.3 trillion, primarily encompassing private financing.

The $300 billion was rightly condemned by the Global South negotiators. This funding will not be only grant-based money but will come from a wide variety of sources, public and private, bilateral and multilateral, including – undefined - “alternative sources”.

In many cases, this will just add debt to the developing countries already heavily burdened by debt from previous development assistance.

So, no agreement that this was all public grants. However, according to the COP29 Presidency, it could have been.

No agreement on how much for Loss and Damage, or Adaptation or Mitigation.

Importantly, the Article 6.2 decision will enable the Secretariat to provide the registry services that countries need thus allowing them to issue mitigation outcomes as units. By doing so these services would enable a country that may struggle to create its own national registry to participate in global carbon markets.

According to the UK newspaper The Financial Times, private climate financing increased from $14 billion in 2021 to $22 billion in 2022.

It is expected for the carbon credit market because of the COP29 decision to grow to $250 billion by 2030. This it has been estimated could grow to enable financial flows from complaint carbon markets to reach US$1 trillion per year by 2050.

The mess at the end of COP29 saw the Parties agree to launch a "Baku to Belém Roadmap”. This will help to identify how to muster the additional trillion.

The fourth Financing for Development Conference can play an additional important role in that journey.

The UN family can and are playing in helping bring private sector finance to the most vulnerable and to ensure that what is being delivered is done in a transparent way.

The White Paper that the Stakeholder Forum launched this week on how the UN Ecosystem of Initiatives on Private Sector Finance is playing its roles in Financing the Sustainable Development Goals and the Paris Climate Agreement is an important resource in understanding the landscape.

This includes the building of norms such as working with guidance for Sovereign Wealth Funds or through the Principles for Responsible Banking, Insurance and Pensions the Sustainable Stock Exchange Initiative and the Public-Private Partnerships for the SDGs.

As we approach the next set of National Determined Contributions (NDCs) UN support for mobilizing and catalyzing an increase in capital flows investments at the national level to help countries deliver their New National Determined Contributions will help guide the delivery to the $1.3 trillion needed.

We live in very difficult times and the challenges of climate change are getting larger the only way this can be addressed is together through strong multilateral agreements and implementation. 

After all, there is to take something  the father of sustainable development Maurice Strong used to say Only One Earth