COP29 Digest, Vol 2: Everything You Need to Know in Food and Climate News Today

Welcome to Volume 2 of Green Queen’s #COP29 Digest. Here, our editorial team curates the must-reads, the must-bookmarks and the must-knows from around the interwebs to help you ‘skim the overwhelm’.

Catch up: VOLUME 1

Headlines You Need To Know

The COP-related news you cannot miss.

AZERBAIJAN PRESIDENT CALLS FOSSIL FUELS A ‘GIFT OF GOD’: Ilham Aliyev, the president of host nation Azerbaijan, has labelled fossil fuels as a “gift of God”, doubling down on the country’s plans to increase oil and gas production. He slammed “Western fake news” about Azerbaijan’s emissions and said countries “should not be blamed” for having fossil fuel reserves. UN chief António Guterres called the comments “absurd”.

FRANCE EXITS COP29 AFTER ALIYEV’S COMMENTS: Those weren’t the only controversial things Aliyev said – he also accused French president Emmanuel Macron’s administration of committing colonial “crimes” and “brutally” killing protestors in New Caledonia. France called the comments “unworthy of a COP presidency”, and withdrew its negotiators. Editor’s Note:

ARGENTINA WITHDRAWS ON TRUMP-ALLIED PRESIDENT’S ORDERS: Argentina also removed its officials from the climate summit on orders of president Javier Milei, who is a staunch backer of incoming US president Donald Trump and attended the Conservative Political Action Conference summit at Mar-a-Lago, Florida. Milei has since implied he wants to withdraw Argentina from the Paris Agreement.

COP29 ATTENDEES PLUNGE AS WORLD LEADERS SKIP SUMMIT: These developments are why this year’s conference in Baku is witnessing a dip in attendance (less than half the amount of delegates compared to Dubai, according to estimates), following the record-breaking numbers at COP28, according to the New York Times.

DEVELOPMENT BANKS LIFTS CLIMATE FINANCE TO $120B A YEAR: The world’s major multilateral banks have announced a joint goal to increase annual climate funding for low- and middle-income nations to $120M by 2030, over 60% higher in what they had funnelled to these countries last year.

EU SET TO MISS CLIMATE TARGETS: By February, governments need to submit updated climate plans to the UN (called nationally determined contributions, or NDCs). But the EU, which will file a collective target for its 27 member states, is on track to miss the deadline, with one official saying it’s “basically impossible”.

UK PLEDGES TO CUT EMISSIONS BY 81% IN NEXT DECADE: UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer updated the country’s emissions reduction target, increasing it from 78% to 81% by 2035. He said there were two paths ahead for the climate fight: inaction and delay, or measures to tackle challenges today and in the future.

ACTIVISTS CALL FOR ADOPTION OF YOUTH CLIMATE CLAUSE: A group of activist organisations are calling on governments to integrate a Universal NDC Youth Clause into their updated climate plans in a bid to champion intergenerational collaboration.

EXXON DISCOURAGES TRUMP FROM PULLING OUT OF PARIS AGREEMENT: Even the head of ExxonMobil, the US’s largest fossil fuel emitter, is asking president-elect Trump to stay in the Paris Agreement, after the Republican promised to pull the US out again once he’s back in the White House.

COUNTRIES URGED TO SIGN PLANT-BASED TREATY: Campaigners are imploring nations to sign the Plant Based Treaty in recognition of animal agriculture’s contribution to climate change, citing the examples of Los Angeles, Amsterdam and Edinburgh, which have begun implementing the treaty’s proposals.

VEGAN FOOD MISLABELLED AT COP29: Already criticised for its meat-heavy menu, activists have found that COP29 has mislabelled a glut of vegan and vegetarian dishes that contain cheese or meat, respectively. They were told it was a “printing mistake”, but the amount of errors seemed too many to be accidental.

INDONESIA TO RAMP UP CLEAN ENERGY INFRASTRUCTURE: Indonesia, the world’s fourth-largest coal producer, is offering investors the opportunity to build 75 gigawatts of renewable energy in the next 15 years.

DIGITALISATION DAY ON THE DIARY: Governments and industry leaders will participate in COP’s first-ever Digitalisation Day today as part of the Green Digital Action track. It will culminate in a Green Digital Action declaration, which involves accelerating emission reductions and promoting digital access.

COP NOT ‘FIT FOR PURPOSE’ ANYMORE: In what is a sad but unsurprising pronouncement, climate policy experts and former UN officials say COP summits are no longer “fit for purpose” and should only be held in countries showcasing support for the crisis, not petrostates.

Key #COP29 Reports

The food and climate reports you need to know about.

• No sign of promised fossil fuel transition: Despite promising to transition away from fossil fuels in Dubai last year, there’s “no sign” of such a shift so far, with emissions from coal, oil and gas rising by 0.8% by 2024, a report shows. For a 1.5°C future, emissions need to be curbed by 43% by the end of the decade.
• Big Oil lobbyists outnumber most national delegations: COP29 is being attended by over 1,770 lobbyists for the fossil fuel industry, a number higher than the delegations of most countries, analysis by Kick Big Polluters Out reveals.
• We’re on a path to 2.7°C: Global wanting projections for 2100 are flatlining with no improvement since 2021, says a report by Climate Action Tracker. This will drive an increase of 0.3°C per decade, putting the world on a path of 2.7°C, which will have terrifying consequences.
• Clean energy set to skyrocket: The global market for green energy tech will expand from $700B today to over $2T in 2035, according to the International Energy Agency. But governments face tough decisions amid tensions and trade-offs on the industrial and trade policies they want to pursue.
• Countries must amp up climate investment: Nations need to invest $6.5M in climate action every year by 2030 to meet their environmental targets, suggests a new report.

Awesome Resources From Media Friends

A curation of our favourite reads from COP29 – excellent guides, explainers and op-eds from around the web.

Only boldness will prevail: Mobilising COP29’s climate finance goal for countries on the frontlines of the climate crisis can protect them from its worst impacts, but only if leaders make bold decisions, writes former UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon.

Trump threatens US climate finance: If Trump rolls back climate policies the way he did the first time around, he will leave billions of dollars in clean energy investments stranded, president Joe Biden’s national climate advisor tells Semafor.

Africa’s position on COP29: As negotiations intensify over the final draft text of COP29, the chairman of the African Group of Negotiators speaks to Nation Africa about their “unshakeable” demand for $1.3BT in climate finance.

Lighter Green Fun

Funny stuff, weird stuff, random stuff related to COP you may enjoy.

A visual guide to COP29: To make sense of everything happening in Baku, The Weird and Wild, a Singapore-based sustainability communications agency, has produced a “super brief” visual explainer to COP29.

A COP Anthem: Nigerian musician Akaycentric and US filmmaker Lisa Russell have created an anthem for COP29, titled Move On, with a music video created entirely from AI.

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