Published

2 years ago

June 19, 2024

Alice Rush

Welcome to Carbon Brief’s Cropped.
We handpick and explain the most important stories at the intersection of climate, land, food and nature over the past fortnight.

Key developments

G7 eyes food progress

ITALY MEETING: The Group of Seven (G7) nations met in Italy last week to discuss a range of issues spanning war and hunger to climate change and energy. The summit saw the seven major economies launch a new initiative for tackling hunger, Reuters reported. Known as the G7 Apulia Food Systems Initiative (AFSI) – named after the Southern Italian region where the summit took place – the proposal aims to “overcome structural barriers to food security and nutrition”, according to a declaration published after the event. According to the newswire, the initiative will focus on low-income countries and support projects in Africa, “one of the top priorities under Italy’s rotating G7 presidency this year”. It added that details of the scheme will be agreed by G7 development ministers in the coming months.

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AFRICA LEFT OUT: Despite having a focus on Africa, agricultural leaders from the continent told Reuters they were not consulted about the new scheme. Ibrahima Coulibaly, president of the West African Network of Peasants and Agricultural Producers, told the newswire: “It is missing family farmers organisations that have not been involved even though small-scale producers will be key to its success.” In African Arguments, Madagascar’s agricultural minister Suzelin Rakotoarisolo Ratohiarijaona was also critical of the lack of involvement of African smallholder farmers in the new scheme, saying: “It’s telling that the Apulia Initiative was developed without their input. If this doesn’t change, it can’t hope to understand or address the daily challenges they face.” He added that the scheme must channel new finance towards grassroots groups and “encourage a shift to more diverse and nature-friendly forms of agriculture”.

‘ZERO’ HARVESTS: The new initiative came as the chief officer of the World Food Programme told BBC News that parts of Africa, as well as the Middle East and Latin America, are now unable to sustain crops due to constant floods and droughts, leaving people completely reliant on humanitarian aid. WFP director Martin Frick told the broadcaster that some of the poorest regions had now reached a tipping point of having “zero” harvests left, as “extreme weather was pushing already degraded land beyond use”. In the east African nation of Burundi, months of heavy rain and flooding has left 10% of all farmland unusable, Frick told BBC News. In the Darfur region of Sudan, cereal crop yields are 78% below the average for the previous five-year average amid drought and civil war, he added.

Food price spikes continue

MULTIPLE CROPS AND CAUSES: Consumers have recently experienced sustained increases in the prices of a range of foods. These price spikes have been attributed to various factors, ranging from climate change and harmful agricultural practices to the international economy and geopolitical tensions. Carbon Brief has just published an article that gathers the views of experts in the agrifood sector on the major causes of this global problem that is already putting pressure on producers, intermediaries and consumers.

CLIMATE-RELATED IMPACTS: Extreme weather events and diseases are hampering harvests and driving up orange prices in Brazil and Florida, Axios reported. The outlet added that in Florida, citrus production has declined 3% on average annually since 2003 and that, according to the International Monetary Fund, the price of oranges globally rose from $2.76 in 2023 to $3.68 in April this year. Prof Andy Challinor, professor of climate impacts at the University of Leeds, told Carbon Brief that “climate change is beginning to outpace us because it is interacting with our complex interrelated economic and food systems”.

CONFLICT REPERCUSSIONS: Dr Rob Vos, director for markets, trade and institutions at the International Food Policy Research Institute, told Carbon Brief that the highest inflation rates have been seen in countries with food systems “disrupted by intensified conflict”, such as Ethiopia, Gaza, Haiti and Sudan. He added that countries with macroeconomic constraints and weak currencies, such as Argentina, Venezuela and Turkey, are also particularly hard-hit. Bloomberg reported that access to agricultural land and workforce reduction due to the war in Gaza has caused Israel’s 29 largest food companies to increase their prices by as much as 30% since January.

UNSUSTAINABLE FARMING: Levi Sucre, coordinator of the Mesoamerican Alliance of Peoples and Forests, told Carbon Brief that overexploitation of land and the use of agrochemicals have increased the demand for fertilisers and the costs of production. For instance, Dr Innocent Okuku, executive secretary of the West African Fertiliser Association, told the Nigerian newspaper Daily Trust that application of fertilisers by smallholder farmers “is getting lower because of the issues around availability and cost”. The most affected are “people with the least resources”, says Sucre. Amongst those “highly vulnerable to food insecurity” are small island developing states, given that less than 1% of their land is devoted to agriculture, 70% of them face the risk of water scarcity and all have lost almost 7% of their agricultural GDP to climate-related disasters, Forbes reported.

Spotlight

Progress on agrifood systems at Bonn

In this spotlight, Carbon Brief explores the progress made regarding agriculture and food security at the recent Bonn climate talks.

The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) formally addresses issues and works towards solutions in agriculture and food systems through the Sharm el-Sheikh joint work on implementation of climate action on agriculture and food security (SSJW).

When SSJW negotiations ended at COP28 in Dubai, several experts told Carbon Brief that those outcomes had been disastrous, with the only tangible result of the summit being an “informal note”, which “essentially means, ‘we talked, we’ll talk again’”, Teresa Anderson, global climate justice lead at ActionAid, told Carbon Brief at the time.

The major sticking points at COP28 were the subject matter of a series of workshops to be held under the SSJW umbrella and the creation of a “coordination group” to oversee the implementation of the recommendations from those workshops.

‘Surprisingly sensible’

In contrast to COP28, this round of negotiations at Bonn were “surprisingly sensible”, Anderson said. Marie Cosquer, an advocacy analyst at Action Against Hunger, told Carbon Brief that “the vibe was nothing like Dubai” and the “parties started to engage constructively from the beginning”.

To begin with, Cosquer said, a “non-paper” with proposals, circulated by the EU negotiators ahead of the negotiations, allowed parties to react and “slowly became a way forward for consensus”. In addition, the G77 plus China negotiating group – who had advocated strenuously for the coordination group in Dubai – took a less hardline stance on the creation of the group.

The negotiators ultimately agreed upon two workshop topics: one on “systemic and holistic approaches to implementation of climate action on agriculture, food systems and food security” and the other on “progress, challenges and opportunities related to identifying needs and accessing means of implementation for climate action in agriculture and food security”.

Roadmap

The draft conclusions from Bonn also provide a roadmap for the remainder of the SSJW’s mandate, which runs to COP31 in November 2026. It lays out that the online portal, where parties will be able to upload their submissions for each workshop, should be developed over the next five months and presented at COP29 in November.

Clement Metivier, acting head of international advocacy at WWF-UK, said the roadmap was an “important and positive breakthrough”. It represented a “prime opportunity for governments to prioritise systemic and holistic approaches to transforming our food systems and make them healthy, resilient and equitable”, he added:

“There is no time to waste.”

News and views

EU RESTORATION LAW: EU ministers have approved the bloc’s nature restoration law, “despite stiff opposition to the plans and threats by Austria that it would seek to annul the outcome of the vote”, the Financial Times reported. The FT said “last-minute changes of heart from Austria and Slovakia” allowed the law to pass. However, the vote from Austria came from climate minister Leonore Gewessler, a Green party politician, who did not obtain approval from her coalition government partner, the conservative Austrian People’s Party, the FT said. In a letter to Belgium, which is currently holding the EU presidency, Austria’s chancellor Karl Nehammer, from the People’s Party, said Austria’s vote was “unlawful” and that his party would seek criminal charges against Gewessler for “alleged abuse of power”, the FT added.

FLOODS AND FOOD: Flooding in southern Brazil that started last month has caused $2.2bn in damages, including $680m in agricultural losses, according to Brazil Reports. The outlet added that “agribusiness is by far the most affected economic sector”, citing a study that found that the floods could cut agricultural GDP by up to 3.5%. Meanwhile, extreme weather in China is “raising concerns about food security” there, CNN reported. High temperatures and severe drought are impacting the northern part of the country while “heavy rains inundate the south”, the outlet said. It noted that the spring and summer planting seasons have been disrupted in key rice- and wheat-producing regions.

COTTON CROPS: High temperatures are “threatening cotton production” in the world’s fifth-largest cotton producer, Pakistan, Bloomberg reported. Nearly 10% of the total crop in Sindh – “one of the country’s most fertile provinces” – has been damaged by heat already, the outlet added, and “the situation is poised to get worse”. According to the country’s meteorological department, the month of June will bring rapid-onset “flash” drought, which can result in water shortages, wildfire and crop failure. Bloomberg added: “Besides cotton, excessive heat is also affecting sugarcane, exportable fruits like mangoes, citrus, banana and seasonal vegetables like chillies, tomato, potato and some lentils.”

ALGERIA RIOTS: The Associated Press reported that “violent riots erupted in a drought-stricken Algerian desert city last weekend after months of water shortages left taps running dry and forced residents to queue to access water for their households”. In the central Algerian city of Tiaret, “protestors wearing balaclavas set tires aflame and set up make-shift barricades blocking roads to protest their water being rationed”, AP said. It continued: “The unrest followed demands from President Abdelmajid Tebboune to rectify the suffering. At a council of ministers meeting last week, he implored his cabinet to implement ‘emergency measures’ in Tiaret. Several government ministers were later sent to ‘ask for an apology from the population’ and to promise that access to drinking water would be restored.”

Watch, read, listen

MOSQUITOES TO THE RESCUE: NPR reported on how scientists are transporting hundreds of thousands of mosquitoes to Hawaii to try to save their native bird species.

DEEP DIVE: On Last Week Tonight, comedian John Oliver dived into the controversy surrounding deep-sea mining. (Note, unfortunately, this is not available to watch in the UK.)

ANCESTRAL FORESTS: Nautilus chronicled an expedition to Hoh Rainforest in Washington state, “one of the largest old-growth temperate rainforests in the world”.

AFFECTED FISHERMEN: A multimedia story by InfoNile explored the impacts of overexploitation and illegal taxes by militias on fish production in Africa’s Lake Edward.

New science

Ice-free period too long for southern and western Hudson Bay polar bear populations if global warming exceeds 1.6 to 2.6C

Communications Earth & Environment

The increasing number of days without sea ice in southern and western Hudson Bay, an inland marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean in Canada, could make the loss of polar bears from this region “inevitable”, even if efforts are pursued to limit future climate change, new research found. The study drew on the latest high-resolution climate models to project the length of the ice-free period in Hudson Bay. The authors said: “Limiting global warming to 2C above pre-industrial levels may prevent the ice-free period from exceeding 183 days…providing some optimism for adult polar bear survival. However, with longer ice-free periods already substantially impacting recruitment, extirpation for polar bears in this region may already be inevitable.”

Intensified future heat extremes linked with increasing ecosystem water limitation

Earth System Dynamics

According to a new study, increasing water stress in land ecosystems will likely amplify the effects of extreme heat on people and wildlife globally. The researchers explained that while heat extremes “are mostly introduced by atmospheric circulation patterns”, they can be mitigated by ecosystems, which can provide a natural cooling service through plant transpiration and soil evaporation when there are ample water supplies. However, when water supplies in ecosystems are limited, heat extremes can be amplified, the new research found. The authors said: “We identify hotspot regions in tropical South America and across Canada and northern Eurasia where relatively strong trends towards increased ecosystem water limitation jointly occur with amplifying heat extremes.”

Early-stage loss of ecological integrity drives the risk of zoonotic disease emergence

Journal of the Royal Society Interface

The emergence of new diseases from animals – known as “zoonotic diseases” – is “strongly linked” to human pressures on biodiversity, new research suggested. The study updated the most comprehensive zoonotic emerging infectious disease event database with the latest reported events to analyse the relationship between new outbreaks and human pressures on ecosystems. The authors said: “We found emerging infectious disease risk was strongly predicted by structural integrity metrics such as human footprint and ecoregion intactness, in addition to environmental variables such as tropical rainforest density and mammal species richness.” Emerging infectious disease events “were more likely to occur in areas with intermediate levels of compositional and structural integrity, underscoring the risk posed by human encroachment into pristine, undisturbed lands”, the authors added.

In the diary

17-20 June: 67th meeting of the Global Environment Fund (GEF) council | Washington DC
18-21 June: ICLEI (Local governments for sustainability) World Congress 2024 | São Paulo, Brazil
19-21 June: G20 third climate and environment sustainability working group meeting | Manaus, Brazil
24-26 June: Organisational meeting of the Preparatory Commission for the Entry Into Force of the BBNJ Agreement and the convening of the first meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the agreement | New York City

This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s fortnightly Cropped email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.

Cropped is researched and written by Dr Giuliana Viglione, Aruna Chandrasekhar, Daisy Dunne, Orla Dwyer and Yanine Quiroz. Please send tips and feedback to cropped@carbonbrief.org.

The post Cropped 19 June 2024: Why food prices are spiking; Bonn climate talks; Plunging polar bear populations appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Cropped 19 June 2024: Why food prices are spiking; Bonn climate talks; Plunging polar bear populations

Climate Change

Broken debt system must be fixed to confront future climate shocks

Published

12 hours ago

April 14, 2026

Alice Rush

Mae Buenaventura is the manager of the debt justice programme of the Asian Peoples’ Movement on Debt and Development, a regional alliance of peoples’ movements, community organizations, coalitions, NGOs and networks

A potentially historic shift in public debt governance is set to unfold in Washington DC this week as Global South governments take a collective stand to stop a “silent killer” of development financing.

The first-ever UN-hosted borrowers’ forum will officially be launched on April 15 on the sidelines of the 2026 Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. Led by five convening countries – Zambia, Egypt, Nepal, the Maldives and Pakistan – the initiative is one of the key wins of last year’s 4th Financing for Development Conference (FFD4) in Sevilla, Spain.

The forum’s mandate is to establish a platform for borrower countries, supported by a UN secretariat, “to discuss technical issues, share information and experiences in addressing debt challenges, increase access to technical assistance and capacity-building in debt management, coordinate approaches and strengthen borrower countries’ voices in the global debt architecture”.

Instead of facing lenders alone, these countries will now use a UN-backed platform to share technical expertise and coordinate their approach to a global debt system that is fundamentally broken.

Debt grips climate-vulnerable nations

The human cost of the current debt architecture is staggering. According to the UN trade and development agency, UNCTAD, more than 40% of the global population – roughly 3.4 billion people – live in countries where the government is forced to spend more on debt payments than on the health, education and social protection of its citizens.

In so-called low-income countries, governments spend an average of 7.5% of their total budgets on debt service, with interest payments consuming up to 20% of total government revenue in these regions.

The Philippines is a case study in this financial stranglehold. It is part of a global majority forced to watch its public services crumble and infrastructure lag while its wealth is siphoned off to satisfy foreign lenders.

The policy of automatic appropriations – a legacy of the rule of late former President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. – mandates that debt servicing takes precedence over any other public expenditure, effectively placing the demands of lenders above the needs of the Filipino people. Even as it faces a $1.5 trillion regional financing gap to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030, its hands remain tied by a legal framework that values credit ratings over human lives.

Jul 3, 2025

Finance

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Charging worries, high prices put brakes on EV growth in Bangladesh

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As a “middle-income country” (MIC), the Philippines is stuck in a frustrating purgatory. It is often deemed “too wealthy” for the G20’s debt-relief framework, yet too poor to absorb global economic shocks. Last year, Finance Undersecretary Joven Balbosa hit the nail on the head when he called for support that goes “beyond the simplistic income categorization” that ignores a country’s actual vulnerabilities.

Without an inclusive and equitable global debt architecture, nations including the Philippines are left to navigate catastrophic climate risks and economic shocks with zero fiscal breathing space.

No respite during climate disasters

The regional evidence of this systemic failure is everywhere. Take Pakistan, which in 2022 was hit by catastrophic flooding that submerged a third of the country and caused billions in losses. Despite this climate-driven disaster, World Bank data shows that Pakistan made payments in 2023 of $11.8 billion for public and publicly guaranteed (PPG) external debt, while its PPG external debt reached $93 billion that same year, surpassing pre-pandemic debt of $87 billion (2020).

Sri Lanka followed IMF prescriptions throughout 16 lending programs since 1991, only to become the first Asian country this century to default. Its MIC status prevents application for debt relief and restructuring measures. Today, the Sri Lankan people bear the brunt of harsh conditionalities, including raising VAT from 8% to 15%, slashing food and fuel subsidies, and the erosion of hard-earned worker pensions.

Residents sit in a Rescue 1122 boat as they evacuate from the flooded area, following monsoon rains and rising water levels of the Chenab River, in Qasim Bela village on the outskirts of Multan in Punjab province, Pakistan, September 11, 2025. REUTERS/Quratulain Asim

Currently, the global rules of lending and borrowing are set by a “creditors’ club” composed of the IMF, the World Bank and the Global Sovereign Debt Roundtable it set up, and the Paris Club.

These institutions measure “debt sustainability” through a narrow lens of a country’s capacity to make timely repayments. They largely ignore internal economic inequalities, gender disparities and the existential threat of climate change.

Crises should trigger debt service cancellation

By organising the new borrowers’ forum, the Global South is signalling that the era of passive “standard-setting” by lenders is over.

The ultimate goal for global civil society and debt justice movements is the establishment of a UN Debt Convention; a democratic, binding and inclusive framework that governs both lenders and borrowers. This mechanism would ensure that debt restructuring and cancellation are sufficient to allow countries to fulfill their international human rights obligations and implement necessary climate actions.

Green Climate Fund picks locations for five developing country hubs

To be truly transformative, debt sustainability analyses must align with human rights and sustainable development needs. This means conducting impact assessments – both before and after loans are issued – to identify “illegitimate” debts that do not benefit the public.

Crucially, we need an automatic debt service cancellation mechanism that triggers during extreme climatic, environmental or health shocks. We also need a binding global debt registry to ensure that every loan is transparent and subject to public scrutiny.

Whether the borrowers’ forum becomes a true milestone depends on its courage to challenge the status quo. We can no longer allow debt to act as a “silent killer” of our future. It is time to demand a financial system that serves humanity, not just the balance sheets of the powerful.

The post Broken debt system must be fixed to confront future climate shocks appeared first on Climate Home News.

Broken debt system must be fixed to confront future climate shocks

Climate Change

Join Greenpeace to save Scott Reef from Woodside’s dirty gas

Published

12 hours ago

April 14, 2026

Alice Rush

Greenpeace and allies will be protesting outside Woodside’s Annual General Meeting to show the WA and federal governments strong community opposition to Woodside’s proposal to drill for gas at Scott Reef.

What: Protest outside Woodside Energy’s Annual General Meeting

When: 8am Thursday 23rd April 2026Where: Kagoshima Park (on the corner of Great Eastern Highway and Bolton Avenue)

RSVP now and join the protest

What’s at stake

Scott Reef is a pristine ocean ecosystem off the north-west coast of Australia.

It is home to endangered and endemic species, including pygmy blue whales and the dusky sea snake, and a nesting ground for green sea turtles. Scott Reef is a place of extraordinary natural beauty, and a vital marine environment that supports a wide range of marine life.

What Woodside is proposing

Dirty fossil fuel corporation, Woodside Energy, is seeking approval to drill more than 50 gas wells underneath and around Scott Reef as part of its Browse project.

The gas would be extracted and transported to the Burrup Hub, the most polluting fossil fuel project in Australia. This proposal would industrialise the doorstep of Australia’s largest freestanding oceanic reef system – threatening the marine life that relies on it and the climate.

Why this can’t go ahead

The WA Environmental Protection Authority has already identified the risks of this project as “unacceptable”, issuing a preliminary rejection.

Serious concerns include:

The risk of an oil spill
Impacts on pygmy blue whales
Damage to green sea turtle nesting grounds

These risks are severe, and potentially irreversible. But the decision hasn’t been made yet. The project is still being assessed.

The Federal Environment Minister is approaching a decision that will determine whether Scott Reef is protected – or vulnerable to decades of industrial gas destruction.

This is a defining moment.