Pledges made so far at the COP28 climate talks
But observers have warned that the headline-grabbing — but voluntary — pledges promoted by the UAE could distract from the more challenging work of negotiating a formal COP28 text at the climax of the two-week talks.
As pressure builds during what is expected to be the hottest year on record, here are some major funding pledges and declarations announced so far at COP28.
— Loss and damage -
The first day of the talks saw the official launch of a «loss and damage» fund to help vulnerable countries cope with the increasingly costly and damaging impacts of climate disasters.
Thursday's agreement came with pledges of $100 million each from the UAE and Germany, $109 million from France, $50 million from Britain, $25 million from Denmark and $17.5 million from the United States, the world's biggest oil and gas producer.
The total committed so far is a little over $576 million, according to a tally by the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental advocacy group.
That falls vastly short of the $100 billion a year that developing nations — which have historically been least responsible for greenhouse gas emissions — have said are needed to cover losses from natural disasters.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa told the summit that «we need to mobilise funding on a far greater scale».
Campaigners said the US offering was woefully inadequate from the world's biggest historical polluter.
Bineshi Albert of the Climate Justice Alliance called it «insulting».
«It is a paltry, shameful amount of money that shows the US is completely uninterested in prioritising or being accountable to the climate impacts frontline communities are facing,» she said.
— Food and farming -
More than 130 countries have agreed to
