The Paris Agreement establishes that the private sector participation will be facilitated in the mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions and in the implementation of nationally determined contributions in coordination of the public sector. In addition, under Decision 1/CP.21, the Parties recognize and request the private sector intervention in additional topics such as financial resources, cooperation to address climate change, and high level engagements.
In the case of business, after the Paris Agreement, governments sent an important market signal that the transition to a clean economy is inevitable, and for the first time, businesses are required to progressively adapt its portfolio investments and models to keep temperature increases to 2 degrees Celsius by the end of the century. In that sense, businesses with strong climate risk management and resilience strategies are expected to gain investor confidence and protect their operations from climate impacts. This will make these businesses more competitive, allow them to continue generate income and, mainly, contribute to the global challenge of undertaking climate change.
Business participation as well as other non-state actors are necessary to create a process to scale up ambitiously the global response to climate change. Several private sector engagement opportunities are possible to implement such as providing climate finance considering that global additional investment and financial flows are required, contributing to the national commitments made by the countries of its operations, and developing low carbon technologies. For that purpose, numerous participatory channels were created by the business sector and under COP 22 its involvement was expected and has been relevant to building alliances and moving the climate change agenda forward.
In that sense, during COP 22, Global Climate Action Champions (Hakima El Haité and Laurence Tubiana) announced the launch of the Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Action, to provide a stable basis for governments and non-state actors to align their efforts in 2017-2020. The purpose of this partnership is to increase cooperative efforts in which businesses, sub-national, local governments and civil society join up with national governments to promote low-emission and resilient development with the purpose to accelerate climate action. In addition, the Marrakech Action Proclamation noted the referred Partnership and called on all non-state actors to join for “immediate and ambitious action and mobilization”.
As a sample of the important role that private sector can have, on November 16, 2016 more than 365 businesses and investors drafted a letter to US President-elect Donald Trump, and other leaders calling to the continuation of low-carbon policies to enable the US to meet or exceed its national commitments; investment in the low-carbon economy to give financial decision makers clarity and increase investor confidence of investors worldwide; and continued US participation in the Paris Agreement to provide the long-term direction. This is particularly relevant considering the global concerns that U.S. President-elect will pull the richest polluter out of the process when he takes office next year, even though, he has recently “softened this opposition” to the international climate change agreement.
In conclusion, the cooperation of non-state Parties is meaningful to face climate change challenges and it is increasingly recognized in the international sphere of actions against climate change. Its participation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is welcome and shall be fostered. However, it is important to recognize that actions by non-Party stakeholders are complementary and not a replacement for Parties’ commitments. Private sector stakeholders cannot substitute the State’s role, specially in the pre-2020 period. A tremendous momentum has been created to keep the promise into action and all initiatives and efforts for climate action are important to increase the support to be provided to governments to fulfill their commitments under the Paris Agreement.
Resources:
Business Backs Low-Carbon USA.
Bloomberg Law. Energy and Climate Report. Trump Open-Mided on Paris Deal.
Marrakech Action Proclamation for our Climate and Sustainable Development.
Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Action
http://unfccc.int/files/paris_agreement/application/pdf/marrakech_partnership_for_global_climate_action.pdf
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