“G7 leadership in climate action is more vital than ever”: UN Climate Change Executive Secretary

Photo caption: UN Climate Change Executive Secretary, Simon Stiell.  Photo credit:Credit: UN Climate Change

The following is a transcript of a speech delivered by UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell at the G7 Ministerial Meeting of Climate, Energy and Environment Ministers in Turin, Italy, on 29 April 2024.

I want to begin today on a positive note. The agreement we reached in Dubai – the UAE Consensus – was a huge achievement.

Every one of you in this room now has less than a year to embed those targets in new national climate plans – NDCs.

Saving your economies from runaway climate disasters will require whole of government and whole of society game-plans.

The good news is, that when you talk to your colleagues in ministries of finance, development, or defence, you can make an argument that is strong and true.

Rampant climate change smashes supply chains, just one of many examples, drying the Panama Canal and stopping shipping, hurting households.

Fossil fuel pollution costs your government billions in extra health costs and lost productivity.

Unchecked global heating threatens peace, bringing instability and forced migration.

The positive case for bolder is equally compelling:

New global trade orders are emerging with cleaner supply chains, bringing immense opportunities to those who move quickly.

The price of clean energy is remarkably stable compared to fossil fuels, and trending down fast.

Climate adaptation brings more security and economic inclusion.

G7 leadership is more vital than ever.

I often hear in forums like this one “that, we cannot possibly move too far forward, lest we predetermine the outcome of negotiations in the UNFCCC process.”

As the custodian of the UN process underpinning global climate negotiations, I’m compelled to set the matter straight: it is utter nonsense to claim the G7 cannot – or should not – lead the way on bolder climate actions.

There is no reason why this forum, comprised of the world’s largest developed economies, cannot collaborate to make bolder strides, that would boost what is possible within the global climate negotiations.

G7 leading from the front – particularly through much deeper emissions cuts, and bigger and better climate finance this year – is entirely doable.  It is essential if we are to avoid a global economic disaster.

Fossil fuels are the core problem, which is why the UAE Consensus agreed to transition away from them, and that transition needs to be much faster and fairer.

The success of COP28 drove home an important lesson to us all, that halving emissions this decade is not just a question of reducing the supply of fossil fuels, it is also a question of reducing demand. Demand from the countries around this table that outstrips the capacity of the global climate system to cope.

Moreover, while all fossil fuel production is fuelling the global climate crisis, G7 economies must do much better in terms of efficiencies and investments in reducing emissions in production, as other regions around the world have already done.

That also means public funds should not being ploughed into fossil fuel subsidies.

And for the G7 that includes phasing out of coal by 2030 to be 1.5 aligned.

I look forward to seeing clear action plans for driving down the demand for dirty emitting fuels embedded in your NDCs early next year.

This year, as we all know, – we must deliver on a New Collective Quantified Finance Goal that enables the scale of climate action we need.

In tandem we must make progress across the financial system:

That means more climate funds this year.

Properly funding multilateral development banks (MDBs) – so they can leverage their balance sheets to provide more concessional finance for climate action.

It means reforming those banks and the wider financial architecture to embed climate risks.

It means working to find new innovative sources of climate finance.

And it means debt relief for the countries that need it most.

Do all of this and the private sector will follow. Vastly increasing the size and impact of investments in climate action.

As we’re in Italy – and the Giro D’Italia is about to begin – I’ll try a cycling analogy. You as climate ministers must be out in front, but the peloton must be made up of every minister across cabinet, working together to push climate action into a higher gear.

Finance ministers and treasurers will be especially crucial. We can only get the climate crisis under control if they treat bold new NDCs, and a quantum leap in climate finance, as core business.

So – if I may be frank – “challenging budget conditions” is not an acceptable excuse for failing to deliver substantial new public climate finance pledges.

And any advanced economy that rolls out this excuse should feel doubly compelled to deliver on other finance fronts, like flexing their shareholder muscle to force bigger and faster efforts by MDBs or pushing on innovative sources of finance.

We stand ready to support in any way possible.

I urge you all to take a clear message back to your entire cabinets and policy-making colleagues:

We can’t afford to defer and delay. To repeat old text in another communiqué. To commit to commit at some far-off point. We must deliver serious climate outcomes, now.

 

Thank you.