ActionAid UK calls on G20 Summit this weekend to scale up climate funding and regulate polluting banking sector now
LONDON - World leaders attending the G20 Summit in New Delhi this weekend should urgently scale up funding to support the world’s most climate-vulnerable communities, and effectively regulate a banking sector that is continuing to profit from the climate breakdown, ActionAid UK said today. The summit comes as India, the host nation, faces intense flooding and landslides in Shimla in the north, and after an intense monsoon and cyclone season that has battered the subcontinent.
ActionAid UK is calling on G20 leaders to not only honour previous climate finance commitments they have reneged on, but to radically scale up the funding needed to adapt to climate change.
“As major powers meet against a backdrop of record-breaking temperatures and after a year of extreme weather events, the stakes couldn’t be any higher.” Dr. Halima Begum, Chief Executive of ActionAid UK, said.
Polluting nations have failed to fulfil their pledge to provide $100 billion annually to help states mitigate and adapt to climate change. A separate loss and damage climate fund agreed at COP 27 last year should be adequately funded and also be channelled directly to the most affected communities. With the UN finding this week that climate change may push nearly 160 million more women and girls into poverty, a failure to act on climate injustice will imperil their future the most, ActionAid warns.
Begum said: “Climate change is the single biggest threat facing our planet. Though we are now facing an existential crisis, powerful nations continue to play fast and loose with human lives and continue driving communities towards their demise. After heating the planet for over a century, major polluters have a moral obligation to those struggling to survive as a consequence of their actions. It's time they fulfilled their promises to stump up the cash and help those that have contributed the least to climate meltdown.”
States should introduce tougher regulations on banks profiting from climate chaos
ActionAid is also calling on global leaders to better regulate big banks and clamp down on profits made through investments into polluting industries. Earlier this week, ActionAid released a damning report which found that banks have poured $3.2tn in financing to fossil fuel companies and $370bn towards unsustainable industrial farming practices since 2015. This includes UK banks, such as HSBC and Barclays, which have funnelled hundreds of billions towards these polluting industries. The charity is calling on governments to tighten banking regulations to stop banks from squeezing enormous profits from fossil fuel loans and investments at the cost of human lives.
Begum said: “The level at which banks are continuing to pour money into these polluting industries is astounding. Just as Emperor Nero fiddled while Rome burned, too many banks are jeopardising our children’s futures and making unconscionable profits as the planet burns.”
She added: “A major reason that many banks are not changing their investment practices is that the incentives are not there and regulations to prevent these astronomical profits are vague at best. The banks risk becoming the Big Tobacco of the 21st Century and one day being held accountable by history for potentially reckless decisions that have seen them shore up polluting industries and profit from climate-damaging investment decisions, which one day could come back to bite them in court. Governments must act with courage to regulate and incentivise banks to start investing in the future of our planet, not the dying vestiges of a retrograde fossil fuel industry. This is now literally about saving lives.”
Debt relief aids climate action
Critical to climate justice is also the issue of debt relief, with the most climate-affected countries indebted to global financial institutions like the IMF. That is why ActionAid UK is also calling for the most climate vulnerable countries to have their debts cancelled, along with a meaningful reform of the way global debt is managed.
Research conducted earlier this year by ActionAid revealed the links between the debt crisis and the climate crisis, with a shocking 93% of countries most at risk of climate change facing harsh debt repayment plans as global inflation rates soar.
Begum said: “The IMF and World Bank are locking countries into a negative spiral – forcing governments in the Global South to slash public spending to pay back an ever-growing mountain of debt. With strict conditions imposed on these loans, communities are unable to make progress on climate action to mitigate its worst effects.”
Begum added: “There is no climate justice without debt justice. Big polluters at the G20 have a vital role to play in debt cancellation, for the sake of our children and the future of our planet.”
ENDS
To contact the ActionAid UK Press Office email charlie.ensor@actionaid.org or call 07804494771. Spokespeople from the press release are available for interview on request.
Notes to editors
About ActionAid
ActionAid is an international charity that works with women and girls living in poverty. Our dedicated local staff are changing the world with women and girls. We are ending violence and fighting poverty so that all women, everywhere, can create the future they want.