CSOs mobilizing for climate justice to #FixTheFinance
Civil society organisations are mobilising for a global week of action calling on governments, banks and financial institutions to #FixTheFinance for climate justice
The world urgently needs climate action. But to solve the climate crisis pushing our planet to the brink, we must fix the world’s financial flows.
April 2024 kicks off a year that will spotlight finance issues as central to the climate conversation.
With the IMF/World Bank Spring meetings and G20 finance ministers’ meeting this April, and bank AGMs being held in the coming weeks, civil society organisations are jointly mobilising to call on governments, banks and financial institutions to #FixTheFinance.
The mobilisations are also part of a wider push for climate action ahead of UN climate negotiations to agree on a critical new climate finance goal at COP29 in November.
A global week of action between the 16th and 19th April 2024 including stunts and mobilisations in a dozen countries, a press conference on Monday 15th April, a webinar on Tuesday 16th April, digital day of action on Thursday the 18th April and an escalation of actions including at the Spring Meetings in DC on the 19th, will highlight how global finance flows are failing the planet and how they must be addressed if we are to have a chance of averting a total climate breakdown.
Organisations participating in the mobilisations include: ActionAid, Global Platforms, Asian Peoples’ Movement on Debt and Development (APMDD), Big Shift Global, Christian Aid, Climate Action Network, Fridays for Future, Oxfam, Power Shift Africa, Urgewald and 350.org.
Far more of the world’s money is still flowing to the causes of the climate crisis than the solutions. The current global financial system is better designed to escalate – rather than address – climate change, vulnerability and inequality. Meanwhile, the appetite for climate action is not matched by a willingness to cover the costs.
Banks, multilateral institutions and regional development banks are financing the fossil fuel and harmful industrial agriculture that are responsible for the climate crisis and destruction of local communities.
Governments are using precious public funds to subsidise destructive international corporations instead of providing real support for community-led climate solutions. Climate disasters and multilateral institutions are pushing countries on the frontline of the climate crisis deeper into debt. And the World Bank is not being transparent, hiding its use of public funds for fossil financing.
Meanwhile, wealthy countries have broken their promises to provide the climate finance necessary to help frontline communities adapt to the impacts and transition to greener pathways, and put the planet on a path to safety. Instead they are offering loans under the banner of climate finance, pushing vulnerable countries deeper into debt traps that lead to destructive fossil fuel expansion.
Organisations that represent and work with youth, women, farmers, Indigenous Peoples, activists and frontline communities are mobilising to remind governments and financial institutions that it is time for them to #FixTheFinance. They are calling on governments, multilateral institutions and private banks to stop financing destruction and to be more transparent, and for the climate finance, debt cancellation, tax justice and shifting of finance flows needed to properly resource community-led solutions and just transitions.
Activities will include: Tuesday 16th-Friday 19th April: Actions, stunts, mobilisations, workshops and climate strikes with ActionAid, Global Platforms, Fridays for Future, Christian Aid and other organisations in multiple countries including Bangladesh, Italy, Kenya, The Gambia, Malawi, Nepal, Nigeria, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
