BRUSSELS
\nWith less than three months until this year\u2019s COP29 UN climate negotiations, countries remain far from agreement on the summit\u2019s biggest task: to agree a new funding target to help developing countries cope with climate change.
\nA negotiations document published by the UN climate body on Thursday set out the splits between nations, ahead of a meeting in Baku next month, where negotiators will attempt to inch forward some of the stickiest issues.
\nThe document suggests seven options, reflecting countries\u2019 competing positions, for a possible COP29 deal. The new target will replace wealthy nations\u2019 current commitment to provide $100 billion each year in climate finance to developing countries.
\nVulnerable and developing countries want a far larger funding goal. Donor countries such as Canada and the 27-nation European Union say stretched national budgets mean a huge jump in public funding is unrealistic.
\n\u201cWe have come a long way but there are still clearly different positions we need to bridge,\u201d said incoming COP29 summit president Mukhtar Babayev.
\nBabayev, who is Azerbaijan\u2019s minister of ecology and natural resources, said the COP29 presidency would organize intensive negotiations on the finance goal ahead of the COP29 summit in Baku in November.
\nOne option in the document sets out a target for developed countries to provide $441 billion each year in grants, combined with an aim to mobilize a total $1.1 trillion in funding from all sources, including private finance, annually from 2025 to 2029.
\nThat option reflects Arab countries\u2019 position.
\nAnother option, reflecting the EU\u2019s negotiating stance, sets a global climate-funding target of more than $1 trillion each year \u2014 including countries\u2019 domestic investments and private funding \u2014 inside which would be a smaller amount provided by countries \u201cwith high greenhouse-gas emissions and economic capabilities.\u201d
\nThe EU has demanded that China \u2014 the world\u2019s biggest polluter and second-biggest economy \u2014 contribute to the new climate-funding goal.
\nChina is classed as a developing country by the UN under a system developed in the 1990s that is still used today. Beijing rejects the idea that it should be on the hook to pay for climate finance, the money mostly paid by rich countries to poor ones.
\nNegotiators expect the issue of who should pay to be one of the biggest hurdles to agreeing a finance deal at COP29.
\nAnother option in the document, reflecting Canada\u2019s position, suggests contributors to the target should be determined on per-capita emissions and income \u2014 a measure that could also add the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and others.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BRUSSELS With less than three months until this year\u2019s COP29 UN climate negotiations, countries remain far from agreement on the summit\u2019s biggest task: to agree a new funding target to help developing countries cope with climate change. A negotiations document published by the UN climate body on Thursday set out the splits between nations, ahead […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":428261,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-428232","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n