Africa: Global Witness At COP30 - Policies for People Over Polluters

At COP30 in Belém, Global Witness is driving forwards a policy agenda that puts people - not polluters - first

COP30 marks a decade since the Paris Agreement was adopted in 2015, when the 1.5°C global heating limit was first agreed. In the 10 years since that watershed summit, a struggle over the spirit of COP has taken root.

Fossil fuel lobbyists have repeatedly outnumbered delegates from climate-vulnerable countries, while petrostates have worked to water down commitments to phase out oil and gas.

Meanwhile the voices of land and environmental defenders, including Indigenous communities, have been sidelined, leaving those most affected by the climate crisis with limited representation in climate negotiations.

With the world now on the precipice of irreversible (and disastrous) global heating, COP30 has been branded the "last chance" to secure humanity's future - including by Brazil's president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

Global Witness is working with partners and allies at COP30 to advocate for meaningful policies that seek to promote climate justice and put the voices and needs of people ahead of polluter profits.

The decisions made at COP30 can't end at Brazil - they must go on to redefine the new era of climate action, and work to make the COP process more equitable.

Global Witness at COP30: Policies for people over polluters

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People in, polluters out: Join Global Witness at COP30

As COP30 convenes in Belém, Brazil, we're bringing together communities, defenders, journalists and policymakers to drive climate justice, expose extractive harms and demand accountability for big emitters and their enablers

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Global Witness policy positions for COP30

Land and Environmental Defenders and the LEAD Initiative

Defenders and Indigenous Peoples are often our planet's last line of defence, sounding the alarm about threats to vital ecosystems and incursions upon their communities from destructive companies.

In return, they face land invasions, harassment and violence, with a worrying rise in criminalisation hitting environmental activists worldwide.

Defenders play a vital role in protecting ecosystems and ensuring that climate solutions are just, rights-based and informed by local realities. Failing to protect defenders not only endangers lives but also undermines global ambitions to tackle the climate crisis.

Brazil, the host of COP30, is historically among the most dangerous countries in the world for land and environmental defenders. The protection and meaningful participation of defenders at COP30 and beyond is an essential element of the fight against climate change.

At COP30, countries must agree to:

Tackle the drivers of harm against defenders by protecting land and environmental rights
Establish strong, binding legal frameworks to uphold corporate accountability and human rights and guarantee the recognition and protection of defenders and their communities
Adopt and implement international and regional declarations, frameworks and mechanisms that protect defenders
Stop criminalisation against land and environmental defenders
Ensure transparent and prompt justice for defenders who have been attacked
Systematically identify, document and analyse attacks on land and environmental defenders

Effective environmental governance, including access to information, justice and meaningful participation, can only be achieved when the lived experience of environmental defenders' are included and their insights and knowledge are prioritised in the fight against climate change.

This includes engaging with the Leaders Network for Environmental Activists and Defenders (LEAD) - a multi-stakeholder initiative that aims to inform global policy solutions and strengthen the recognition, protection and participation of defenders in climate decision-making spaces.

To properly engage with defenders at COP30 and all future COPs, countries must:

Guarantee safe and meaningful participation of defenders and their communities in all COP spaces and processes. Host countries must uphold the rights to peaceful assembly, freedom of expression, access to information, and public participation; provide free, fair and efficient visa processes; and ensure unrestricted access for accredited observers to negotiation spaces. All states should commit to and uphold non-retaliation clauses prohibiting surveillance, harassment, detention or reprisals before, during or after COPs.
Hold regular consultations with defenders on protection mechanisms before and during negotiations - and integrate learnings across national climate policies, including in nationally determined contributions (NDCs), long-term strategies and Article 6 authorisations. Women defenders must be fully included in the implementation of the updated Gender Action Plan (GAP). Additionally, countries must conduct regular reporting under the Global Stocktake (GST) on the protection and inclusion of defenders in climate decision-making processes.
Ensure COP outcomes include defender-focused language, including explicit commitments to defender protection and participation. Formally and publicly recognise the role of land and environmental defenders in advancing climate solutions and justice, as well as acknowledge the violence they face globally.

Read more about land and environmental defenders:

Forests

Forests are at the heart of COP30. Despite global commitments to end and reverse forest loss by 2030, deforestation continues at alarming rates.

Our latest investigation shows that financial institutions have earned more than US$26 billion from financing companies accused of deforestation since the Paris Agreement, revealing how the finance sector continues to fuel, rather than fight, the climate and nature crisis.

Meanwhile, the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) - the signature nature initiative of COP30 - could redefine finance for forests, or fail to offer any real protection.

The TFFF is a proposed fund that would use public and private sector funds to invest into financial markets. The proceeds of these investments would be used to repay the investors and to send payments to tropical forest nations who prevent deforestation. This structure could allow for a sustained source of finance for decades to come.

Forested countries receiving these payments would send at least 20% of their payment to Indigenous Peoples and local communities.

In a promising move ahead of the COP, the TFFF promised to exclude investments in fossil fuels and deforestation. However, many lingering questions remain about equity and efficacy.

Heading into COP30, countries must:

Commit to regulating harmful finance and trade that is driving forest loss. Governments must pair efforts to mobilise funding for forests and local communities under the TFFF with commitments to introduce national legislation that ends trade in products produced on deforested land and the flow of harmful finance to companies accused of deforestation. This includes the adoption of mandatory due diligence frameworks for companies operating in high-risk sectors, such as agriculture, mining and fossil fuel exploration, with obligations to secure the free, prior, and informed consent (FPIC) of Indigenous Peoples.
Ensure the TFFF doesn't become an exercise in greenwashing. The TFFF should publish their investment strategy, including safeguards for adverse human rights impacts. The TFFF's asset manager selection process must require a track record of climate-aligned investments, and the TFFF should commit to making publicly available their list of investments over the fund's life. Furthermore, Indigenous communities and leaders should have decision-making power in the TFFF's oversight and governance frameworks.
Ensure the alignment of National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs) and NDCs. These plans must be devised with rights-holders and aligned with the GBF and Glasgow Leaders' Declaration on Forests and Land Use, as well as the Paris Agreement, to create reinforcing climate mitigation and adaptation plans that respect communities' rights and help end forest loss by 2030.

Read more about finance's dealings with tropical forests:

Transition Minerals

A just and equitable transition demands that we rectify past environmental harms while also building a future that centres justice.

With the global demand for transition minerals and energy systems skyrocketing, COP30 comes at a crucial moment for countries to redefine the systems of extraction and benefit-sharing into the future.

The energy transition must not come at the cost of communities, landscapes or global equity. As nations gather at COP30, countries can begin this realignment through a shared goal to build a more open, transparent and inclusive process for mineral sourcing.

This includes a meaningful participation and leadership of Indigenous Peoples and local communities in decision-making processes, and a commitment to seek out alternative economy and circular models that help to reduce demand for critical minerals.

Looking at COP30, we are campaigning to seek:

A decision to establish the Belem Action Mechanism (BAM) for a Global Just Transition to support coordination and accelerate just transition pathways in resource-rich countries.
A formal recognition of principles and recommendations outlined in the report of the UN Secretary-General's Panel on Critical Energy Transition Minerals.
Establishment of inclusive multilateral action to strengthen transition minerals governance within the UN, including through strategies to improve trade justice and reduce mineral demand equitably, with full participation of Indigenous Peoples, civil society, producing countries, academia, workers, women, youth and experts from all regions.
The establishment and enforcement of legally-binding no-go zones and robust legal frameworks for Indigenous autonomy and right to self-determination.
Transparency should be the rule across the project development process, including the full publication of environmental, climate, and social impact assessments as well as a standardised greenhouse gas emissions reporting protocol.

Read more about transition minerals and supply chains:

Fossil Fuels

We need to protect climate policymaking from vested industry interests by banning fossil fuel lobbyists from attending COPs.

Global Witness will once again use its data investigation skills to help the Kick Big Polluters Out coalition classify COP attendees and determine how many of them are registered to attend in Belém on behalf of the fossil fuel industry.

This will equip climate-vulnerable nations, civil society and communities around the world that are impacted by climate crises with concrete evidence of industry interference.

This work adds to the growing calls by the climate justice movement for the UNFCCC to insert a firewall and safeguard the policies defining our future from the influence of big polluters.

At COP30, countries must agree to:

Implement the immediate phaseout of fossil fuels within energy systems while providing the billions needed by frontline nations to adapt to the climate crisis. As the principal source of carbon emissions, oil, gas and coal continue to exacerbate global heating, with 2024 seeing a record jump in atmospheric CO2 concentrations.
A commitment to a full, rapid and equitable phaseout of the production, exploration and use of all fossil fuels in line with the Paris Agreement target to keep warming to below 1.5°C and parties' human rights obligations. In particular, countries must implement the guidance of the IEA and UN and commit to end all new oil and gas projects, none of which are Paris-compliant.
Genuine progress towards a carbon pollution tax that would apply to historic emitters. As the main beneficiaries of economic development since the dawn of the industrial era, developed nations and their industry leaders must pay their fair share to compensate maturing economies and climate-vulnerable nations and help them adapt to the climate change that has already been made inevitable by carbon pollution. Countries must agree upon a "polluter pays" principal that allows for the taxation of historic profits derived from up-, mid- and downstream fossil fuel revenue.

Read more about protecting climate spaces from fossil fuel lobbyists:

Global Witness at COP30: Policies for people over polluters

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Africa: Global Witness At COP30 - Policies for People Over Polluters

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