Finally, one of the matters was brought up. For two days there seemed an unspoken agreement at the Paris summit on the creation of a new global financial system. The topic was allowed to be discussed without worrying about two unspoken matters. But at least one was too obvious not to be brought up at the brief media conference in the final hour before the summit wrapped up.
Wanyonyi Wambilyanga of Kenya’s Standard Newspaper Group asked: “What role will Africa play ... to ensure it is considered an equal partner?” His country’s president, William Ruto, seemed a tad taken aback and replied that Africa would bring ideas. It would help devise solutions to fund the just transition that would include carbon taxes, financial transaction taxes, and shipping and flight taxes. Earlier Ruto had alluded to the need for African presidents to commit to some fundamentals. That might have been a vague reference to the need to improve governance.
He mentioned Africa is the continent with the largest reserves of renewable energy — wind, solar, hydro and geothermal — and also has the fastest-growing population and the most uncultivated arable land. “We will bring our ideas on how to unlock this huge potential,” said Ruto.
President Cyril Ramaphosa warned the financiers that funding could not come with instructions. “A plan must not be imposed. We have to address [the challenge] on our terms,” he said, in reference to the $8.9bn just energy transition partnership agreed between South Africa and four major Western states. The detailed estimate of the likely cost involved in a transition plan has been hiked to $89bn.
Estimates of funds needed to ensure developing countries can fight poverty as well as climate change run into the trillions of dollars, the same sort of money spent on saving banks a few years ago.
At no stage did any of the hundreds of Paris delegates mention, even whisper, anything that might have sounded like the imposition of Washington Consensus-type dogmatic policies. Reasonable enough, given that the summit was all about overhauling the institutions — the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) — that had traditionally enforced the pro-market “reform” economic policies as a condition for any funding provided to vulnerable developing countries. Decades later, even the World Bank and IMF like to distance themselves from the Washington Consensus.
Also not mentioned was why there was such an urgent need to address climate change. Centuries of industrialisation, which have made Europe, the US and, more recently, China, enormously wealthy, have wreaked havoc on the global environment. By most counts, Africa is set to suffer more than any other part of the globe.
Because the world is not a fair place, the polluters will balk at making payments and will deny responsibility
The US is not only the second-largest carbon dioxide emitter, accounting for 13.8% of the world’s total but, more significantly, it is responsible for 25% of historical global emissions — dating back to 1751. That is double what China has contributed. The EU’s historical contribution is 22%, compared with 9.6% now. China leads the list with 29.3%. Africa accounts for only 4% of global emissions, and doesn’t feature on the historic chart at all.
In a fair world, the solution to Africa’s need to battle poverty and climate simultaneously would be simple enough: send the bill to the big polluters. This may have been the unspoken message at the Paris summit.
But chances are, because the world is not a fair place, the polluters will balk at making payments and will deny responsibility. Consider what the EU is planning — a unilateral imposition of tariffs on carbon-intensive imported products. Those imports will come from countries that came late to industrialisation, including South Africa. Hardly the actions of a guilty party wanting to assist its victims.
Or, if the responsible parties are not going to provide the funds, perhaps they could assist Africa in recovering the estimated $88.6bn a year it loses in illicit financial flows. Or abandon a tax-avoidance, anti-money-laundering greylisting system that is wholly ineffectual and immoral in penalising only poor countries.
Of course we mustn’t ignore the fact there’s much Africa could do to improve its governance, which is too often characterised by varying degrees of kleptocracy.
An idealistic view would be to regard the climate crisis as an opportunity for the nations of the world to put to rights the sins of the past.
The alternative is that Africa suffers a third devastating assault by Europe and the US as they scrambled to get and now stay rich — first came slavery, followed by colonisation, and now we have climate destruction.
Anyone think Africa hasn’t put enough on the table?
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