António Guterres: “The world will not be able to use all the oil and gas that are already discovered”

UN Secretary-General Calls on G7 Leaders in Interview to Meet Their Economic Commitments to Help Poorest States to Counter Warming

The G-7, the group of most industrialized countries on the planet, celebrates from this Friday an important summit from which a historic fiscal agreement to set a minimum corporate tax is expected to come out. This face-to-face meeting, which will last three days and will be held in Cornwall (United Kingdom), will be attended by António Guterres (Lisbon, 72 years old), Secretary General of the United Nations. Guterres wants to convey to the leaders of the G-7 – Germany, Canada, the United States, France, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom – two clear messages: the need to guarantee vaccination against covid-19 to all the inhabitants of the planet and the obligation that the most developed countries have to fulfill their economic promises so that the poorest regions can combat the effects of global warming.

“It’s a question of justice,” he says of climate aid that developed countries must provide. “If we look at the current impacts of climate change, it is already the developing countries, the African countries, the small island states, that are paying a higher price,” he says in a videoconference interview granted to EL PAÍS, the British newspaper The Guardian and the American network NBC News within the Climate Covering Now project, an international media consortium created to boost information on climate change in the world. “It is only right that there is compensation for the impacts that already exist and that are dramatic,” he adds about a problem whose historical responsible are the richest countries.

Those promises of aid to developing areas were included in the Paris Agreement, signed in December 2015, which not only seeks to keep the already irreversible increase in temperature within the least catastrophic margins. It also aims for richer states to help poorer ones reduce their emissions and adapt to the impacts of warming. The commitment was that the countries with the most resources would mobilize 100,000 million dollars annually from 2020. “That hasn’t happened,” Guterres says. “We still need to increase the financing commitments of developed countries in the public part, not to mention the private part, by between 20,000 and 30,000 million dollars,” says the UN Secretary General.

Figuring out the level of funding that has been reached is really complicated and generates a lot of debate. The OECD, which represents the interests of donor countries, released a study at the end of 2020 in which it assured that in 2018 78,900 million dollars of climate financing had been reached; to know the balance of 2020 this organization said that it would have to wait until 2023. But that amount includes direct public aid, loans of all kinds, private investments … And a report by the NGO Oxfam also from the end of last year greatly reduced the real value of this aid – up to 20,000 million dollars – if you take into account only direct subsidies and eliminate the loans from that balance.

“The problem lies in the clarification of how the contribution of the private party is, but the OECD report, which is a credible institution, although it is a club of rich countries, shows that we are still far from fulfilling what has been promised and that it is necessary to clarify the way in which the Paris commitment will be fulfilled, “- says Guterres. That is exactly what he will demand from the G-7 leaders: to clarify “the way in which the 100,000 million dollars a year are going to be mobilized for mitigation and also for adaptation.”

“Developing countries are paying the highest price for climate change”

The arrival of the promised funds is a matter of “justice”, but it is also a way to “restore trust between developed countries and emerging economies”. “It is not enough for developed countries to commit to reaching net-zero emissions [emitting only the CO₂ that can be captured by sinks, such as forests] by 2050, as they are doing. Emerging economies need to do so as well. But to do so, it is absolutely essential to restore confidence with these emerging economies and demonstrate that the developed world will meet its financial commitments.” He adds: “Without the restoration of this confidence it will not be easy for emerging economies to commit to achieving net-zero emissions and that commitment is essential. Without China, without India, without Brazil, without South Africa, without Indonesia, without these countries we will not achieve carbon neutrality in 2050.”

The UN secretary-general applauds the return of the United States to the climate fight and the new goals of that country to reduce its emissions. “They represent an extremely important development because we now have around 70% of global emissions covered by net-zero emissions commitments.” But he argues that the US must make a greater effort, precisely, in climate financing: “It needs to clearly go above, I would say, more than double the commitments it has already made.”

CO_₂ price and coal financing

Guterres believes that the fiscal pact that is expected to be finalized at this summit “is a step in the right direction.” “It is unacceptable to verify that some of the large multinational companies, especially in the technological areas, practically do not pay taxes when their profits have risen in a brutal way with the pandemic,” adds the HEAD OF THE UN. But, in addition, he believes that this pact can open the door for a price to be set on international carbon dioxide, that is, an instrument that taxes emissions. “I hope that an international agreement will be possible before COP26 in Glasgow [la cumbre climática que se celebra en noviembre en la ciudad escocesa]. And that at COP26 an agreement on Article 6 of the Paris Agreement is possible to allow the global creation of a carbon market”, something that was not achieved at the Madrid summit in 2019.

Guterres advocates putting in place measures to make that “carbon price and even a carbon tax” “fiscally neutral.” “It is necessary to create a carbon tax but also to reduce above all the income taxes that have to do with work, with wages. If both things are done at the same time, there may be an acceptance by society. If one only taxes carbon, there can be rejection, you need to be smart. Taxing carbon should not be done to increase public revenues.” “If we put a price on carbon and stop fossil fuel subsidies, many of the investments that are still being made with a fossil fuel-linked recovery perspective will obviously not be profitable,” he says.

“Coal is still the worst problem we face. And many countries are still addicted to coal.”

The G-7 summit is expected to result in the commitment of these seven powers to stop financing coal-fired electricity generation projects with public funds by the end of this year both inside and outside their borders, according to what the environment ministers agreed in May. “Coal is still the worst problem we face. And many countries are still addicted to coal; we have to create the conditions for a transition from coal to renewables,” Guterres said. “We call for complete elimination by 2030 for OECD countries and by 2040 in the rest of the world.”

But, as Guterres acknowledges, that will not be enough and it is also necessary to target oil and natural gas, also sources of greenhouse gas emissions. “I am convinced that the world will not be able to use all the oil and gas that is already discovered. Continuing to exploit new projects, in my opinion, does not make any sense,” he says of a recent report by the International Energy Agency that advocated that governments not authorize new oil and gas exploitation in order to comply with the Paris Agreement.

Guterres also notes with satisfaction some recent movements in companies that emit high greenhouse gases, such as oil companies. And he cites the example of Exxon, in whose assembly a couple of weeks ago there was a rebellion that ended with the appointment of three directors at the proposal of an activist fund against climate change. “It was the shareholders, the small investors, who have mobilized to ensure that there is a representation of the green vision of the future in the management of the company. Today there is a consciousness that is in civil society, that is in cities, that is increasingly in the business world and in the financial world, which in my opinion must also mobilize governments.” Because, in Guterres’ view, “the private sector is probably advancing more strongly than governments.

Source: The Country