COP 29 drew to a close on 24 November after lengthy negotiations in which the countries of the South came away extremely disappointed if they ever had any hopes of the outcome of this major meeting of nations on the climate issue.
Launched in 1995, the United Nations Climate Change Conference aims to limit greenhouse gas emissions by drawing up a roadmap for governments, and in particular by allocating funding for the transition to green energy and the damage caused by the climate crisis. In the name of equity, the countries that traditionally emit CO2 will finance the less developed countries. On paper, why not? But there are several problems with such a configuration.

Firstly, new countries such as China and the Gulf States have themselves become major emitters and do not wish to pay for the others. The developing countries therefore find themselves begging the countries of the North, which can once again present themselves as benefactors by allocating just 300 billion dollars a year between now and 2035. The group of African countries wanted 1,300 billion! While China’s position is untenable, the pussyfooting of European countries, which have all relocated their most polluting factories to China, while pointing the finger at it as one of the biggest polluters, is just as reprehensible.

Another major problem is that the method of funding is not determined and rarely takes the form of simple donations. Today, 69% of climate finance is in the form of loans, which does nothing to improve the situation of countries that are already heavily in debt. Developing countries also rely on carbon markets for their financing. These are trading systems in which carbon credits are sold by small polluters to big ones. To have any hope of investing, small polluters have to rely on others to pollute their own territories. Which is a bit absurd when you consider that global warming and most forms of pollution (water, air, waste) do not stop at borders.

Finally, renewable energies, whether installed in the North or South, are always based on rare metals, the extraction of which in certain countries (the Democratic Republic of Congo, Bolivia, Chile and Morocco) has catastrophic environmental and social consequences. The international division of labour remains unchanged, with an imbalance in disfavour of the countries responsible for supplying natural resources at low prices and forced to buy high-tech finished products from developed countries, which are inevitably more expensive.

As we can see, ‘green finance’, despite its bucolic name, is still cold finance with little concern for equality. Like the ‘green grabbing’ denounced by researchers, the appropriation of land, labour and natural resources remains the ultimate goal of capitalism, whatever its colour.

Capitalism is doing all the better as the working class loses strength in developed countries. Fed on consumption by their own exploiters, workers fear losing purchasing power, which is little compensation for a life of servitude. Lulled by climate sceptic rhetoric and the hope of closed borders, they think they can get away with it. But accepting borders means running the risk of one day finding yourself on the wrong side. As for thinking that climate change won’t happen, even Donald Trump and his buddy Elon Musk don’t believe it. What’s the point of all the bunkers that billionaires build for themselves if not to protect their lives from the chaos that they create? These leaders are not climate sceptics, they are climate cynics.
So unless we can afford to build ourselves a bunker, we have no choice: let’s unite!