Fossil fuel subsidies almost doubled in 2021
29/8/2022: Major economies are struggling with longstanding pledges to phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies. Support for fossil fuels in 51 countries worldwide almost doubled to $697 billion in 2021.
Source: OECD
‘Epic’ Pakistan floods show need for climate action
29/8/2022: Pakistan is among the countries most vulnerable to climate change. It faces rates of warming considerably above the global average. Campaigners are calling on countries most historically responsible for climate change to support vulnerable countries’ adaptation efforts.
Source: Human Rights Watch
Heat renders parts of Africa ‘not suitable’ for life
31/8/2022: According to a senior European humanitarian official, parts of Somalia, northern Kenya and Ethiopia are becoming uninhabitable due to rising temperatures. Almost 3 million people in the Sahel region are surviving in pre-famine conditions.
Source: Devex
Omens are good for a CoP15 plan to protect nature
30/8/2022: Despite many challenges, December’s crucial biodiversity talks in Montreal may set a new path for humans to live with nature. If agreed, the Global Biodiversity Framework would reboot conservation by greatly expanding protected areas, phasing out billions of dollars of subsidies that harm nature, and reducing pollution.
Source: The Guardian
UN fails to reach agreement to protect marine life
27/8/2022: Negotiations to establish a UN Ocean Treaty to protect biodiversity in two-thirds of the world’s oceanic areas have closed without agreement. Environmental campaigners expressed disappointment and blamed wealthy countries, including the US, for being too slow to compromise.
Source: The Guardian
Countries must step up efforts to protect freshwater sources
25/8/2022: As events marking World Water Week continue in Stockholm, countries are urged to do more to adapt to the cascading impacts of the climate crisis on freshwater ecosystems, with increasingly frequent and intense dry periods interspersed with floods and extreme precipitation.
Source: UN Environment Programme
Rainforest politics of the DRC oil auction
23/8/2022: The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo has two main goals in selling oil blocks that overlap with the world’s second largest rainforest. Neither involves developing oil.
Source: African Arguments
Bleak picture for marine life without emissions cuts
25/8/2022: New research has found that nearly 90% of marine life would be at high or critical risk by 2100 if the world continues upon a high-emissions pathway. Poorer countries at lower latitudes, least equipped to adapt, are the ones that face the highest risk.
Source: Mongabay
UN negotiations to decide the fate of the oceans begin
15/8/2022: The final negotiations for a Global Ocean Treaty are in progress. To be considered a success, the meeting must pave the way for 30% of the oceans to be protected from destructive activities lby 2030.
Source: Greenpeace International
To end illegal fishing, we need transparency now
18/8/2022: Insufficient monitoring, loopholes, and weaknesses in China’s regulatory framework makes possible illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing and human rights abuses on an industrial scale. Ocean ecosystems are heading toward total collapse.
Source: Devex