UAE's al-Jaber urges more financing to help Caribbean and other ... - The Associated Press
UAE's al-Jaber urges more financing to help Caribbean and other regions fight climate change | AP News
UAE’s al-Jaber urges more financing to help Caribbean and other regions fight climate change
FILE - Designated UN conference president Sultan al-Jaber attends the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bonn, Germany, Thursday, June 8, 2023. The head of this year’s United Nations’ climate talks called Thursday, July 13, 2023, for governments and businesses to tackle global warming by reducing greenhouse gas emissions in all regions and sectors if they want to stop the planet from passing a key temperature limit agreed more than seven years ago. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The head of this year’s U.N. global climate summit urged more availability of funds to fight climate change in the Caribbean during a regional meeting Thursday in Barbados.
Sultan al-Jaber, the United Arab Emirates’ minister of industry, noted that high costs have prevented island nations from quickly adopting renewable energy as they face what he said was some of the world’s harshest climate impacts.
“The peoples of the Caribbean have been on the front lines of climate change for longer than most,” he said. “Your experience represents an early warning system for the rest of the world.”
Al-Jaber spoke to leaders from a 15-member trade bloc known as Caricom during an event broadcast online, saying that closing the climate finance gap is a priority ahead of the COP28 summit in Dubai in December.
Al-Jaber spoke the same day that the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration increased its prediction for the Atlantic hurricane season from near-normal to above-normal given record sea surface temperatures. Some 14 to 21 named storms are now expected, with two to five major hurricanes.
Five tropical storms already have formed this year, marking an unusually busy start to the season, which runs from June 1 to Nov. 30.
“This region knows only too well the human and economic costs of too little finance for climate adaptation and resilience,” al-Jaber said of the Caribbean.
He credited Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley for creating a plan known as the Bridgetown Initiative, which would make it easier for developing nations to fight global warming and postpone debt payments when disasters occur.
Supporters have said the plan could free up $1 trillion in climate financing.
On Wednesday, Mottley announced that her administration would create a legacy fund to help Barbados fight climate change.
Related Knowledge Center: Climate economics
Climate change is now a driver of the world’s economy. The impact is profound:
- Catastrophic weather events — hurricanes, floods, droughts, high temperatures — are more frequent and more extreme. The cost can be measured in both the initial damage caused and the longer-term impact on the economy.
- Vulnerable communities are increasing climate-related investments, hardening infrastructure and taking other protective measures.
- Investment in carbon capture and storage technologies is increasingly rapidly.
- Governments are making investments and crafting regulations to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.
On top of all of this is the cost of uncertainty. As the Fourth National Climate Assessment, released in 2018 by the U.S. Global Change Research Program, says, “The assumption that current and future climate conditions will resemble the recent past is no longer valid.”