Reaction to COP29

300 billion for the climate is too little for many

The climate negotiations ended with an "absolute minimum compromise and a half-hearted goal", attests Greenpeace.

(Bild: AP)

On Sunday night, the UN Climate Change Conference in Azerbaijan adopted a new framework for the international financing of climate protection and adaptation to climate impacts. According to this, the annual contribution, primarily from industrialized countries, is to be increased to at least 300 billion dollars by 2035. A disappointment for many.

"The world has missed the opportunity to finally open the money taps needed to tackle the climate crisis worldwide. This is a bitter disappointment for all those whose livelihoods and homes are already being destroyed by the climate crisis," says Jasmin Duregger, climate and energy expert at Greenpeace in Austria.

"Half-hearted goal"
 The climate negotiations ended with an "absolute minimum compromise and a half-hearted goal".

However, the agreement to develop a roadmap for increasing funding by the next climate summit in Brazil is a glimmer of hope: "Ways must be found there to make the real perpetrators of the climate crisis - the fossil fuel industry - pay."

Guterres: "Don't give up"
 "I would have liked a more ambitious outcome," commented UN General António Guterres on X. "Our fight continues. And we will never give up."

WWF criticizes gaps in climate protection
The environmental organization WWF rates the outcome of the COP29 World Climate Conference as a "grossly negligent political failure". "The result is a political declaration of bankruptcy."

"Even in the hottest year since records began, the fossil-fuelled countries were able to prevent important progress and water down the resolutions," says WWF climate spokesperson Reinhard Uhrig. 

"Disappointing and irresponsible"
The Alliance for Climate Justice rates the outcome of the World Climate Conference in Baku (COP29) as "disappointing and irresponsible". The new financing target - which does not even correspond to a doubling in real terms - is far too low to cover the increasing demand in countries of the Global South. Furthermore, there has been no progress in phasing out coal, oil and gas.

"Countries are delivering far too little for people and the climate. In addition, a large part of the responsibility is being shifted to private companies and the affected countries," criticized the alliance.

Biden: "Historic" resolutions
US President Joe Biden has welcomed the resolutions of the Climate Change Conference as "historic" and declared that there is no chance of a relapse into the old days in terms of climate policy before his designated successor Donald Trump takes office. "While some may try to deny or delay the clean energy revolution underway in the US and around the world, no one can undo it - no one," Biden emphasized in a statement following the conclusion of COP29 in Baku.

Former US presidential candidate Al Gore, on the other hand, did not describe the agreement as a "failure", but neither was it a success. "Once again", only the "absolute minimum" had been achieved.