COP29 president: ‘COP is the best system we have, we cannot lose faith in it’

Mukhtar Babayev speaks with Dialogue Earth about the outcomes of last year’s UN climate summit in Azerbaijan and expectations for COP30 in Brazil

The Blue Zone at COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, 2024. Delegations representing parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will meet again this November at COP30 in Brazil, amid mistrust over the current progress towards finance targets (Image: Ministério do Meio Ambiente e Mudança do Clima / Flickr, CC BY NC SA)

When Azerbaijan hosted the United Nations’ climate summit, COP29, last year, hopes were high that it could deliver a breakthrough on climate finance, one of the most contentious issues in the global climate process.

The result was a commitment by developed countries to “take the lead” in mobilising USD 300 billion annually by 2035, part of a wider goal to unlock USD 1.3 trillion from all public and private funding sources by the same year. This was hailed by some as a step forward from the previous pledge of USD 100 billion by 2020, but questioned by others as insufficient in the face of a mounting climate crisis.

This year, COP30 will be hosted in Brazil, with an agenda focused on implementing last year’s finance pledge and raising the bar on climate action. Countries are also due to arrive in the host city of Belém with their updated plans for climate action, known as nationally determined contributions. This is happening amid geopolitical tensions that are diverting countries’ attention, and a feeling of distrust by some climate experts and civil society over the progress of the climate negotiations.

COP29 president Mukhtar Babayev at an event in 2024. He argues that UN climate conferences are critical forums, where smaller, climate-vulnerable countries can have an equal voice in negotiating action on climate change (Image: Ahmed Nayim Yussuf / UNEP, CC BY NC SA)

In an interview with Dialogue Earth, Mukhtar Babayev, Azerbaijan’s minister of ecology and natural resources, and the president of COP29 – a role he remains engaged in until COP30 opens in November – reflected on what was achieved in their host city of Baku, and what lies ahead in Brazil. He argued that COP29 laid the groundwork for scaling up climate finance and described the COP process as imperfect but indispensable, acknowledging a distrust between developed and developing countries.

Dialogue Earth: Looking back at COP29, many observers called the finance deal insufficient. Do you believe the outcome matched the urgency of the climate crisis?

Mukhtar Babayev: The COP29 presidency did everything we could to push parties for the highest possible ambition on climate finance. When developed countries proposed a goal of USD 250 billion, we were clear that they needed to go further, and we are proud of our work to increase that to USD 300 billion.

The USD 300 billion was never intended to solve the entire climate crisis alone. If parties, multilateral development banks and the private sector can implement the entire goal and scale up climate finance for the developing world to USD 1.3 trillion per year, then it will be a historic step towards achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement.

The previous USD 100 billion pledge took more than a decade to materialise. Why should vulnerable countries trust that new finance commitments will actually be delivered?

In our travels and engagements this year, we have seen that trust on climate finance between developed and developing countries is lacking. To restore this trust, we need to learn the lessons of the USD 100 billion pledge and show progress now against early climate finance milestones.

That means donor countries doubling adaptation finance by the end of this year, as they promised in COP26, tripling the outflows of UN funds by 2030 and donors setting out now how they will contribute their share of the USD 300 billion by 2035.

Since securing the Baku Finance Goal last year, the COP29 presidency has taken every opportunity to engage with donor countries and hold everyone to account for the promises they made.

Fossil fuel phase-out was one of the most divisive topics at COP29. Did Azerbaijan’s economic interests in the fossil sector influence the summit’s outcome?

Like every host country, Azerbaijan acted as a neutral mediator of negotiations at COP29, working to help all parties reach for the highest level of ambition. At COP28, the world agreed to the just, orderly and equitable transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems. At COP29, we wanted to take the next logical steps in that journey.

We used our action agenda to address key gaps in the world’s approach to the energy transition. The COP29 Energy Storage and Grids Pledge created a new goal to increase global energy storage capacity to six times above 2022 levels, and we launched new commitments on green energy zones and corridors, as well as clean hydrogen.

Ultimately, COP is a party-driven process and despite our efforts, parties could not reach agreement on the UAE Dialogue and the Just Transition Work Programme. However, the presidency texts for these topics have formed a promising starting point for this year’s negotiations, so we are continuing from where we left off in Baku.

The topic is also a difficult one for Brazil, which relies on fossil fuels for exports and has faced criticism from civil society for continued fossil expansion. What role do you expect the energy transition to have at COP30?

Our top priority this year is backing Brazil and working with them to make COP30 a success. The COP30 presidency has made it clear it wants to explore how to ensure a just, orderly, and equitable energy transition. We are ready to support our Brazilian colleagues and follow their guidance and leadership in Belém.

The UN climate process itself has been criticised as too slow and compromised by vested interests. After presiding over COP29, do you believe the COP system is still fit for purpose?

At COP29 we proved that the world can still agree, and the COP process can still deliver. The Baku Finance Goal represents the largest financial commitment ever made in a UN process.

It is true that the COP system is not perfect and the strains on multilateralism are greater than ever – we should be discussing how to improve the process to ensure it works as well as possible.

However, COP is the best system we have, and we cannot lose faith in it – we should not lose sight of its strengths and everything it has already delivered. COPs are a critical forum where smaller, climate-vulnerable countries get an equal voice.

Now is the time to protect and preserve the process, and the best way to do that is to deliver on the promises we have made.

Trust between the Global North and South remains fragile. What did COP29 do to rebuild that trust? What are the challenges ahead?

It is clear that climate finance is one of the key components of trust between developed and developing countries. At COP29, we set the framework to build confidence and trust over the future of climate finance, with the commitment for developed countries to take the lead in mobilising USD 300 billion of climate finance by 2035.

Now, we need to reassure developing countries that the world will deliver on that framework, and the best way to do this is by hitting early climate finance milestones.

We know that countries are facing domestic and international challenges that compete for their attention and resources and threaten to distract from climate action. That is why we are working this year to engage everyone involved in climate finance. This is how we will ensure that everyone remains focused on the delivery of the agreements we reached at COP29 in Baku.

Civil society groups complained about limited access and shrinking civic space in Baku. This is also being discussed for COP30 amid costs of accommodation and logistical challenges. Are COPs becoming less inclusive?

COP29 was the second largest COP meeting ever, with areas dedicated to creating a space for civil society, including activists, businesses, the public, youth groups, academia and artists, to come together and make their voices heard. Civil society had a strong presence in Baku, and played an important role in pushing all negotiators to adopt the highest possible ambition.

We have every confidence in Brazil, and they have our full support. Brazil has a thriving civil society ecosystem, and the Brazilian presidency’s call for a “Global Mutirão” (a concept of Brazil’s Indigenous communities, meaning mobilisation) provides an important framework to harness the energy of people and organisations in Brazil and across the world.

Looking ahead, what’s the single most important decision COP30 must deliver for the process to retain global credibility?

The historic agreements reached at COP29 marked the end of the first decade of the Paris Agreement. We are now entering a new era, where our actions will count for more than our words. In this decade of delivery, it is critical that we implement the commitments we have already made – crucially, that includes the delivery of the Baku Finance Goal and the USD 300 billion promised at COP29.

Author: Fermín Koop

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This article was originally published on Dialogue Earth under the Creative Commons BY NC ND licence. Read the original article.