Climate Heroes: Not rich but committed
25 June 2019
ECO is very pleased to have witnessed 26 countries publicly committing to “step up” and enhance their NDC by 2020 at the CAN booth here in Bonn:
Belize, Benin, Brunei, Burkina Faso, Dominican Republic, DRC, Ghana, Grenada, Honduras, Indonesia, Jamaica, Kenya, Lebanon, Micronesia, Morocco, Nepal, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Senegal, Seychelles, Tanzania, The Gambia, Tonga, Uganda, Vietnam, Zimbabwe.
However, ECO realises that these nations are all developing countries. Many are least developed countries (LDCs), the poorest. There has been a noticeable absence of all the richer OECD and Annex I nations, as well as highly emitting countries in the G77 and China Group.
ECO did some number crunching on most of these countries with regard to their present contribution to the climate emergency we are facing as well as their capability to address enhanced NDCs at home.
These countries emitted about 820Mt CO2 from fossil fuels in 2016. This is 2.5% of all global CO2 fossil fuel emissions and 7% of the OECD total.
These countries register an annual average of 0.9tCO2 per capita emissions. This is about 80% below the world average and over 90% below the OECD average.
Total GDP of these countries in USD was about 2.3% of global GDP and 3.5% of OECD GDP. While these countries represent 12% of the global and 72% of the OECD population, their annual per capita GDP is about USD 1,930, only 19% of the global average, and 5% of the OECD’s.
ECO can only conclude:
These countries are small emitters €“ and small contributors to the climate crisis.
These countries are poor countries €“ and have a much lower capacity to act.
But they are doing much more than the wealthy countries of this world. They are the moral compass of the entire climate negotiations. They are true leaders. Shame on those rich nations, with the notable exception of Finland, Denmark, and a few others, who are not getting their act together.