Brazil’s COP30 presidency must do more to protect the UN climate negotiations from the “unchecked” influence of the fossil fuel industry and other high-emitting businesses driving the climate crisis, more than 200 civil society groups said in a letter published on Wednesday.

Campaigners have called on the organisers of this year’s summit to lead by example and commit to a “polluter-free“ conference by banning sponsorship from corporations whose activities drive climate change and by ending their partnership with PR firm Edelman, among other measures.

As Climate Home News previously revealed, Edelman won a $835,000 contract to help Brazil’s COP30 team with its international media strategy for the UN talks while also working with Shell, which is investing in new oil and gas production in the South American country and beyond.

COP30 PR firm found to be “uniquely reliant” on fossil fuel clients

“For years, major corporations – especially in the fossil fuel and other heavily polluting sectors – have undermined climate action through intense lobbying, including at the UN,” said Lien Vandamme, a senior campaigner at the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), one of the letter’s signatories. “Reforming the UN climate talks is more urgent than ever – COPs cannot continue as corporate trade shows.”

Tackling corporate influence

Almost 1,800 fossil fuel lobbyists were given access to last year’s COP29 talks in Azerbaijan, according to analysis by the Kick Big Polluters Out coalition – more than the government delegates of the 10 most climate-vulnerable countries combined.

Amid growing pressure from civil society to tackle corporate influence on the talks, the UN climate change body in September introduced new transparency guidelines giving COP observers the option to disclose who is paying for their participation at the annual summits.

But campaigners want further actions to shield the talks from corporate representatives who, they say, have “sabotaged climate progress through aggressive lobbying, disinformation, and glossy PR campaigns”.

In the letter endorsed by 229 non-governmental organisations (NGOs) across the globe, they urge the COP30 presidency to advance the establishment of an “accountability framework” that should define what constitutes a conflict of interest at UN climate talks – and how such cases should be addressed by setting clear “rules of engagement”.

Business invited to Belém

The letter was organised by members of the Kick Big Polluters Out coalition in response to an earlier missive from COP30 president André Corrêa do Lago, inviting business leaders to show up in the Amazonian city of Belém this November.

Despite the logistical challenges in the host city, including the sky-high cost of accommodation, he urged companies “to attend and engage through solutions, partnerships, investments, and ideas” so that COP30 could become “the world’s largest marketplace of transformational climate solutions”.

But campaigners criticised Corrêa do Lago’s words, saying his overture to the business world felt removed from the reality that polluting companies, and their enablers, are directly responsible for the climate crisis.

“It’s unacceptable that the COP30 president has invited corporations to the table without explicitly addressing the inevitable risks of greenwashing and conflicts of interest,” said CIEL’s Vandamme.

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NGOs urge Brazil to prevent fossil fuel capture of COP30 climate summit