The Brazilian diplomats who will be in charge at the COP30 climate summit in November have said that they want an “early harvest” at June’s mid-year climate negotiations in Bonn, aiming to secure agreements on two key issues that were left unresolved at COP29 last year.
Liliam Chagas, Brazil’s lead climate diplomat was quoted as telling reporters that she is seeking “real advances in the Bonn sessions” on the fledgling Just Transition Work Programme (JTWP) and recommendations from the 2023 Global Stocktake (GST) of government climate action, so that decisions to move them forward can be approved at COP30.
The JTWP is a series of dialogues on how to make the transition to a greener world fair while the GST discussions focus on how the world’s governments should respond to being collectively off track to meet their goal to limit global warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial times.
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Negotiators began talks at Climate Week, a UN event held in Panama this week, using an informal format called “world café” – grouping them in tables to discuss issues such as the role of Indigenous people and communities, economic drivers and social protections.
It will be recalled that late last year, at COP29 in Baku, governments were split over what aspects of fairness the JTWP should tackle and whether finance should be included, as well as on whether transitioning away from fossil fuels should be mentioned in texts on how to take the GST forward.
Chagas said that these issues had not been settled at COP29 because separate talks there on a new finance goal had proven so “lengthy and difficult”, but added that she was now trying to bring a “sense of urgency” to officials.
“These decisions, at this point in the year, they are something that will show that the COP process works [and] is resilient,” she said, adding that she wants to “early harvest some of the decisions in order to not leave everything for [COP30] in November”.
The COP30 Presidency expressed similar sentiments in its third open letter to negotiators released on Friday.
Story was adapted from Climate Home News.
