Sustainable Views

COP29: In the early hours of Sunday morning countries agreed  a New Collective Quantified Goal on Climate Finance to triple public finance to developing countries, from the previous goal of $100bn to $300bn a year by 2035. Its size and the emphasis on private finance to find further funding have been roundly criticised. The climate summit was “not a success, but at best the avoidance of a diplomatic disaster”, said Ottmar Edenhofer, climate economist and co-director of the PIK - Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. Read more analysis below. #COP29 #climatefinance #climatefinancegoal https://lnkd.in/ebPBjy8w

News: As COP29 negotiations reach their final stages, it remains unclear whether agreement can be reached on a New Collective Quantified Goal for climate finance. A new draft text focused on the climate goal was published earlier today stating that developed economies would commit to “taking the lead” on providing $250bn in annual climate finance by 2035, and calls on “all actors to work together to enable the scaling up of financing” for developing countries from public and private sources “to at least $1.3tn” a year. Many developing countries say that the $250bn a year figure is still too small. Elsewhere, there looks likely to be scant progress on adaptation finance and implementation. Any explicit mention of a "fossil fuel phase-out" is also missing from the text, another likely point of contention as negotiations enter their final stages. Read Sustainable Views' analysis below. #COP29 #NCQG #climatechange https://lnkd.in/e-YDB3HT

As I write in today's Sustainable Views as per the #EUDR mess and now plans by commission president Ursula von der Leyen to combine amendments to the #CSRD, the EU #taxonomy and the #CSDDD into a single omnibus regulation... 💥 Explaining EU policymaking to the uninitiated is always complicated. Since MEPs and the European Commission decided all legislation, even hot-off-the-press laws that have yet to be implemented, were fair game for change, the process has become a Kafkaesque nightmare that seems never ending and nonsensical, even to those of us used to Brussels bureaucracy. ⚠️ Julia Otten suggests the kerfuffle around the EUDR, with deregulation-obsessed MEPs fired up by the re-election of Donald Trump as US president, shows the commission may be unable to control what happens next should it go ahead with its omnibus plans. ❗ Otten tells me she fears the reasons behind these laws are being lost, including how they can help rather than hinder the competitiveness of companies, as politicians jostle for “short-sighted and dangerous” political gain. https://lnkd.in/ewZJqwEy

Thirty-two investors have written to six US-headquartered food companies urging them to adopt standardised nutrition reporting. The group, co-ordinated by responsible investment non-profit ShareAction, says food companies must be accountable for their impact on public health. Poorer diets lead to higher sickness levels, harming economic productivity, long-term business success and financial returns, they add. Most major food companies use in-house nutrient profiles to assess the healthiness of their sales, meaning they are in effect “marking their own homework”, ShareAction co-head of health Thomas Abrams tells Sustainable Views. Read more below. #responsibleinvestment #systemicrisk #publichealth https://lnkd.in/eXV4gsdU

The market-shaping capabilities of #financialinstitutions make them critical players if we are to deliver a #netzero economy in time to avoid the worst effects of the climate crisis. This is why #climatefinance is taking top billing at #COP29. Mobilising enormous sums of capital was also a major feature at last month’s #biodiversity COP in Colombia, and will be again at the #desertification COP next month in Saudi Arabia. All three areas — climate, biodiversity and desertification — face major #financegaps in the trillions. On the eve of final #UNFCCC negotiations, I share in the Financial Times Sustainable Views why applying a #humanrights lens to addressing these finance gaps can help states and financial leaders understand the systemic risks facing them and serve as a powerful bridge between the three COPs.

Once again, another must-read article from Elizabeth Meager. “Just because the board and sustainability team have signed off on a science-based target, that doesn’t mean that regulatory affairs, tax teams and lobbying firms are on board or have been told,” WMBC deputy policy director Dominic Gogol told Sustainable Views. But sometimes it is more about weighing up the advantages against the disadvantages. “To a tech company, the chamber is very aligned on policy issues related to cyber security, data privacy and tax, and so the government affairs team would acknowledge climate misalignment. But it’s not such a detractor that it outweighs the benefits we get in other areas,” says one former tech CSO who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “It’s heartbreaking and devastating for a climate person to hear that, but it’s the reality.” As Bruce Freed, president and co-founder of the Center for Political Accountability, told Sustainable Views, this is a “cop-out” because trade associations depend on corporate fees to survive. Companies can, and should, tell associations to stop obstructing progressive policies, he added. https://lnkd.in/eKEpkn3U

Analysis by the European Supervisory Authorities on the impact of transition risks on banks, investment funds, pension funds and insurance companies between 2023 and 2030, suggests transition risk is on its own “unlikely to threaten financial stability”. Secretary-general of non-profit Finance Watch, Benoît Lallemand, says that while the assessment is a “great foundation to build on”, but “it gives a false sense of security and comfort to policymakers — at a time when climate science tells us urgent and ambitious action is badly needed”. Read more below. #transitionrisk #transitionfinance #climaterisk https://lnkd.in/e3KeDFP7

COP16, the UN biodiversity talks, did not deliver as expected but the $400mn in public funding under the Global Biodiversity Framework announced was welcome, write Laura García Vélez nature specialist and Marc Palahí chief nature officer at Lombard Odier Group in Sustainable Views today. Nonetheless, the sum represents only 2 per cent of the amount needed to be mobilised each year to overcome the nature finance gap, they add. Private efforts to address this gap also represent only 18 per cent of nature finance. Private sector finance should focus on the shift to a circular bioeconomy, making nature-based solutions central to value chains, they argue. Read more below. #COP16 #bioeconomy #naturefinance https://lnkd.in/eA33ppZ2

Why do companies remain members of trade associations that spend millions lobbying against climate policy? Because progressive climate laws are only a "nice to have" for most industries, apparently. Meanwhile industry groups, who seemingly have little skin in the climate policy game, land on these extreme positions because of a small number of members - typically fossil fuel companies - “who are incredibly motivated and forceful. For them it’s existential; and then, for the rest of your members, climate policy is a ‘nice to have’, but the [climate] crisis may not be an existential threat to business.” https://lnkd.in/e3T-j3t7 Sustainable Views We Mean Business Coalition Dominic Gogol ClimateVoice Deborah McNamara The Center for Political Accountability Bruce Freed InfluenceMap

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