COP29 Bulletin Day 8: G20 disappoints Baku on climate finance goal

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Little help from G20 on finance

At a press conference in Baku yesterday, COP29 President Mukhtar Babayev sent a cry for help with unlocking finance talks to the G20 leaders summit in Rio de Janeiro.

“The world is waiting to hear from them,” he said, adding “we want them to provide clear mandates to deliver at COP29 – this is their chance to show leadership.”

While Baku slept, G20 leaders in Rio put out a joint statement on tackling everything from hunger to artificial intelligence.

But the section on the COP29 finance goal was brief. “We look forward to a successful New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) outcome in Baku,” it said.

“We pledge our support to the COP29 Presidency and commit to successful negotiations in Baku,” it added.

At the UN climate summit, officials and campaigners alike had hoped for more of a boost. Reuters reported yesterday that, according to two diplomats, the communique had planned to mention developing nations’ voluntary contributions to climate finance – one of the main sticking points in the COP29 finance talks where rich nations want to expand the donor base. But that did not make it into the final text.

Veteran climate campaigner Harjeet Singh accused G20 leaders of a “stark failure”. He said: “Their rehashed rhetoric offers no solace for the fraught COP29 negotiations, where we continue to see a deadlock on climate finance”.

“Without decisive progress on finance at COP29, we are steering towards a catastrophic temperature scenario, where the most vulnerable will bear the gravest consequences,” he added.

Still, some other analysts gave a more positive take on the G20 declaration. Andreas Sieber of climate campaign group 350.org said it could not be described as a “breakthrough” but had “got us a step closer to agreeing a finance deal here”, calling the leaders’ backing for the finance talks “significant”.

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