Progress of Global Stocktake 

Syllabus: GS3/ Environmental Pollution & Degradation

In Context

•  The Bonn Climate Change Conference closed after two weeks of intense work that made progress on several critical issues  including the global stocktake, climate finance, loss and damage  among many others.
  • It will  help lay the groundwork for the political decisions required at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP28) at the end of the year.

More in News

•  In the Bonn negotiations, developing countries were able to strengthen the ‘just transition pathways’ as opposed to the developed countries which laid more emphasis on mitigation. 
  • India also stated that the route to ‘just transition’ needs to be clubbed with the means of implementation.

About the Global Stocktake

• Global Stocktake is essentially a periodic review of global climate action which aims to assess whether current efforts will enable us to reach the objectives set out in the Paris Agreement. This includes 
  • Progress on greenhouse gas reduction, 
  • Building resilience to climate impacts, and 
  • Securing finance to address the climate crisis.

• The Global Stocktake is mandated under Article 14 (1) of the Paris Agreement to assess collective progress towards long-term global goals.

• This is the first Global Stocktake year since the Paris Agreement was signed in 2015 and the report has been underway for the past two years. 

Why does the Global Stocktake matter?

• The global stocktake will help national governments see what they have achieved so far in implementing their climate plans, identify what still needs to be done to meet their targets, and highlight opportunities to increase their ambition on climate action.
• The global stocktake is critically important because the international community has yet to live up to its commitments and climate action 

Conflicting agendas and Issues :

• During the recent Conference , Negotiations surrounding the Global Stocktake  faced challenges due to debates over financial matters.
  • Developing countries, led by the G-77 and the Like-minded Group of Countries, argued why the outcome of the global stocktake process should be based on equity and common but differentiated responsibilities.
• In 2015, under the Paris Agreement, countries had agreed to “pursue efforts” to limit global temperature rise to 1.5°C. 
  • The two agenda items remained points of contention between the developing countries and the Environmental Integrity Group represented by the European Union and others. They are:
    • Mitigation pathways compatible with the temperature goal, and 
    • Climate finance flows from developed countries to developing countries to enable them to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions (in line with Article 4.5 of the Paris Agreement).
• Climate finance flows issues:  Climate finance flows are not aligned with the priorities identified by countries in their nationally determined contributions. 
  • In the domain of international monetary transfers, accounting remains highly contested. 
• Mitigation Work Programme: The Environmental Integrity Group insisted on the Mitigation Work Programme to be yielding the finance. 

• The developed countries wanted that the “Mitigation Work Programme”, which calls for urgently scaling up emission reduction efforts in this crucial decade to fight climate change, be included in the agenda. 
• The developing countries, however, strongly opposed this, saying mitigation efforts cannot be discussed without considering finance.

Way ahead

• In the efforts towards aligning climate finance with the Paris Agreement temperature goals, it is important to integrate the World Bank in climate change negotiations and hold it accountable as it is making huge investments in fossil fuels. 
• Therefore, the pursuance of the Global Stocktake as per the Paris Agreement needs to comply with the principle of equity, justice and fairness.
• The Global Stocktake outcome should focus on how climate change impacts, actions and responses have a bearing on the developmental priorities of developing countries.