China and India demanded rich countries provide financial support for them to improve their climate plans, as leaders ready to meet in a UN summit in New York.
The summit continues to be personally convened by UN secretary general António Guterres as a moment for political leaders to exhibit their willingness to increase their climate plans and deepen the decarbonisation of the economies.
Guterres asked governments in the future prepared to announce the plans they'll set next year.
But in separate statements published on Tuesday, the world's first and fourth largest emitters place the onus on rich countries to fulfil their commitments to mobilise $100 billion per year by 2023 for developing countries to cope with the impacts of climate change.
As the biggest developing country, China “also enjoys the authority to receive funds”, it inside a statement authored by the ministry of ecology and environment.
It said developed countries should “implement and strengthen” and “honour the commitment” to “offer the developing world in addressing climate change”.
In its statement, India's ministry of finance said its plan was focused on a “best effort” basis which “finance holds a key for those its actions”.
With uncertain finance and technology provision, “India are only able to aspire to implement the already promised climate actions”, the statement said. It added that India “may only be capable of elaborate or clarify its post 2023 climate” plan at the summit.
Instead, India said is going to be “better placed” to “suitably recalibrate [its climate plan] through re-examination and improvement,” in 2023, once the next global stocktake to ramp up ambition is due to take place.
The UN summit will include a discussion of climate finance, but it is not given the primacy of Guterres’ demand ambition.
Beijing put down its action around the summit's nine work tracks, but remained ambiguous on what it might bring to podium on Monday.
China reaffirmed its commitment to implement the Paris Agreement, but fell lacking coming to a commitments on its climate targets for Monday’s summit.
Its contribution to global warming, it said, includes the country’s 2023 and 2030 climate targets and also the establishment of “an economic system that is green and low-carbon cycle development”. It added it might “actively implement emission reduction commitments, and strengthen climate adaptation”.
“In light of tough economic and geopolitical prospects, China is pondering its choices on climate,” Li Shuo, senior energy and climate policy officer at Greenpeace China told Climate Home News, adding that Beijing's position paper left “plenty of wiggle room for any decision to double down on climate targets in 2023”.
Last week, UN special envoy for climate change Luis Alfonso de Alba said he was “very confident” that China can come towards the summit “with a significantly higher-level of ambition”, talking about a statement it issued with France and Guterres on the sidelines of the G20.
However, the stronger language in the G20 statement by which China committed to “update” its climate target “in a manner representing a progression beyond the current one” and publish a long term decarbonisation strategy by 2023, is absent from the position paper.
Even the language of China as a “torchbearer” for climate action used by president Xi Jinping was absent, with instead references to China as “an active participant and defender of the multilateral climate process”.
“True leaders rise to the challenges of time,” warned Li. “If geopolitical challenges have remaining Chinese leaders unsure, the country’s over-achievements of their climate targets and also the improving quality of air should offer confidence,” he explained.
Both China and India's positions echoed an argument issued alongside Brazil and Nigeria last month, highlighting the requirement for civilized world with greater historic emissions to shoulder greater responsibility.
For Xi’s government, this principle is “the basis for mutual trust” and the “conditions for the full and efficient implementation from the Paris Agreement”, according to its latest statement.
Luca Bergamaschi, a senior associate at think-tank E3G, said China and India were developing clean technologies some time at a faster pace than civilized world.
“In a truly globalised world, this old north-south divide doesn't make sense,” he said.
“Although there is still a high responsibility for civilized world to provide more climate finance and lead with climate action, there is a need for a lot more cooperation to produce open, 'zero-carbon' markets and to accelerate technology uptake and green finance reforms.”
