Brazil’s COP30 president has called for governments to set up a new forum to discuss trade issues, following a series of disagreements at recent COPs over whether trade-related measures belong on the agenda of global climate negotiations.

Speaking during a World Trade Organization (WTO) event in Geneva last week, André Aranha Corrêa do Lago proposed the creation of an “integrated forum on climate change and trade” and hailed it as a “flagship initiative from our COP30 action agenda”.

He said climate and trade “have been discussed in silos for too long”, saying a new forum would foster trust and ideas to deal with trade issues, which include the harmful effects of climate-related trade measures, such as tariffs on high-emissions goods, carbon pricing, or export curbs that could hamper the green transition.

At the last two COPs – and at mid-year talks in Bonn – emerging economies have tried unsuccessfully to push what they call “unilateral trade measures” onto the agenda, saying policies such as the European Union’s carbon border tax are protectionist and harm their economies. The EU and other developed countries have opposed a dedicated agenda item.

In May, before the Bonn talks, Brazil’s COP presidency urged governments not to introduce “potentially contentious new agenda items that could further burden the process or detract from agreed priorities”. Despite that call, emerging economies proposed an agenda item on “trade-restrictive unilateral measures” and the ensuing debate delayed the start of the talks.

Avoiding a fight?

But Corrêa do Lago’s proposal, which Brazil will ask governments to support at COP30 in Belém in November, received a lukewarm response from governments on both sides of the debate.

“It remains unclear how creating this additional forum would add value to the existing processes,” a European Union source told Climate Home News, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“[The bloc] already regularly engages with global partners on the links between trade, climate and environmental policies — bilaterally, plurilaterally and multilaterally,” the source added, saying that took place already under the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the WTO.

A climate negotiator from an African country said they did not understand what the proposal sought to achieve.

“[Perhaps Brazil is] trying to avoid an agenda fight by establishing this forum”, the negotiator said, asking not to be identified, adding that it was unclear how the new body would be funded.

“Source of fresh thinking”

Corrêa do Lago said in Geneva the proposed forum would be insulated “from the calculus of concessions and gains so we can focus entirely on the calculus of what is possible and necessary”, saying it would be distinct from both the WTO and the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change.

“Think of it as an upstream tributary, the source of fresh thinking that feeds into the two main streams of our multilateral system,” he said. “Its role will be to explore ideas and gather critical mass behind mutually empowering solutions, free from the constraints of formal proceedings.”

Climate experts said that while trade issues were not being properly discussed as part of climate negotiations, it was unclear how a new forum might help.

“A forum focused on climate and trade is a timely intervention, as this discussion currently is not happening at the WTO, and the EU is preventing discussions on trade at the UNFCCC,” said Avantika Goswami, climate lead at the India-based Centre for Science and Environment, a nonprofit research organisation.

But she said “there is a lot of baggage with the intertwining issues of trade and climate, and it is unclear if a new forum will resolve old tensions.”

Developing countries must “have a buy-in” on any new forums “to ensure that the harmful impacts of climate-related trade measures do not further entrench existing inequalities”, she added.

Li Shuo, director of the China Climate Hub at the Asia Society nonprofit group, said the Brazilian proposal could serve as a way to “help the rest of the COP get underway more smoothly”.

He said any new forum should not focus solely on carbon pricing and border taxes. Instead, he said, governments should discuss the “elephant in the room”, which is “do you buy Chinese solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, and electric vehicles? If not, what is the credible, convincing strategy for decarbonisation?”

Colette van der Van, head of Tulip Consulting which focuses on the trade-environment-development nexus, said the proposed forum could be “the fresh start needed to overcome the existing stalemate”, especially as it is being proposed by a developing country in Brazil. But, she added, the initiative could be just “yet another initiative” if it is not backed by a diverse group of countries.

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Brazil’s call for COP trade forum gets lukewarm response