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climate finance
Climate Adaptation Failure Is the Next Debt Crisis for the Global South
This is the new face of global inequality: Countries that contributed least to the crisis are being made to pay twice—first through climate impacts, and then through debt.
Nov 11, 2025
As deadly storms ripped through the Caribbean, a new United Nations report delivered a sobering warning: The world is failing to prepare for the climate it has already created.
The UN Environment Programme’s Adaptation Gap Report 2025, aptly titled Running on Empty, finds that developing nations will need between US$310 and $365 billion annually by 2035 to cope with intensifying climate impacts. Yet, international public finance for adaptation fell to just US$26 billion in 2023, down from US$28 billion the previous year. The result: Only one-twelfth of what’s needed is being delivered.
This gap is not an abstract number. It’s visible in the wreckage of homes, farms, and economies across our region. Last month, Hurricane Melissa, the strongest-ever storm to hit Jamaica, tore through the Caribbean, leaving destruction equivalent to nearly 30% of the island’s GDP. With at least 75 lives lost and damages exceeding US$50 billion, Melissa is not just another storm; it is a case study in the cost of global inaction.
A rapid attribution study found that climate change made Melissa four times more likely and increased its wind speeds by 7%, raising damages by around 12%. For Haiti, Jamaica, and other small island developing states (SIDS), such storms bring unbearable losses eroding livelihoods, tourism revenues, and vital infrastructure. These countries contribute the least to global emissions yet bear the highest costs.
Adaptation finance should not create more debt.
The pattern repeats globally. This year’s monsoon floods in Pakistan displaced 7 million people and destroyed thousands of homes. Whether in South Asia or the Caribbean, the message is clear: The failure to invest in adaptation is costing lives.
Adaptation is not a distant goal; it is an urgent necessity. It means building stronger flood defenses, adopting climate-smart agriculture, and developing social protection systems that safeguard the most vulnerable. Research by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) shows that every US$1 invested early in resilience saves more than US$5 in avoided losses. Yet, the world continues to spend far more on disaster relief than on prevention.
Every dollar delayed multiplies the human and economic toll. In Haiti, where communities are already grappling with political instability, weak infrastructure, and high poverty, each storm magnifies vulnerabilities. The Caribbean, with its densely populated coastal areas and economies heavily dependent on tourism and agriculture, cannot afford to treat adaptation as optional.
At COP29 in Baku, governments pledged through the Baku to Belém Roadmap to mobilize US$1.3 trillion by 2035, including at least US$300 billion annually for developing nations. On paper, this looks ambitious. In reality, it falls far short of what is needed. Adjusted for inflation, adaptation costs could reach US$440-520 billion per year by 2035, and the US$300 billion target covers both mitigation and adaptation, with no separate adaptation goal yet defined.
Adaptation finance was meant to help nations prepare for rising seas, harsher droughts, and lethal floods. Yet, when those funds don’t arrive, countries are forced to borrow. In 2023, 59 least developed countries (LDCs) and Small Island Developing States (SIDS) paid US$37 billion to service their debts and received only US$32 billion in climate finance. These aren’t productive investments but emergency debts taken just to rebuild what has already been lost.
This is the new face of global inequality: Countries that contributed least to the crisis are being made to pay twice—first through climate impacts, and then through debt. And while the rhetoric of “resilience” fills summit halls, the financial architecture remains rigged against the Global South. Only 15% of adaptation finance in recent years has been delivered as grants; the rest comes as loans. For every dollar of “climate support,” developing nations are paying back many more in interest.
The IIED notes that less than 10% of global climate finance reaches the local level, while international credit rating systems penalize small and vulnerable economies for their exposure to climate risks making it harder for them to attract investment in resilience. These structural barriers are blocking climate justice.
So what should change?
Adaptation finance should not create more debt. Countries hit by climate disasters need grants, not loans, because these crises are caused by global emissions, not their own failures. Second, global lending rules must change. The IMF and World Bank should consider pausing repayments after major disasters. Forcing countries to rebuild while paying high interest is unfair and makes recovery harder. Third, regional cooperation must grow stronger. Shared projects prove that joint action works. Regional funds, supported by concessional finance and local expertise, can deliver faster results than slow global systems.
Adaptation is not charity. It is justice and economic common sense. Without equitable support and reparations, the Global South would sink further and keep on building the same roads and homes after every flood, hurricane, and storm. This is not only senseless but also highly unjust. It is time for the Global North to take responsibility, after all its only fair that the poor and vulnerable shouldn’t have to fix a crisis they didn’t create while drowning in debt.
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The Planet Wreckers Are Holding the World Back; We Must Call Them Out at COP30
Leaders have a choice: continue shielding fossil fuel interests, or stand with the majority of the world demanding a fast, fair, and funded transition away from oil, gas, and coal.
Nov 10, 2025
As world leaders gather in Belém for COP30, the stakes could not be higher.
Ten years after the Paris Agreement, despite the progress made the world has reached a breaking point. We’ve temporarily breached 1.5°C of warming, climate impacts are accelerating faster than even scientists feared, and people, especially in the Global South, are suffering the consequences. The past year has brought record-breaking heat, deadly floods, and wildfires from California to the Amazon. But despite the mounting evidence, the fossil fuel industry and a handful of rich countries continue to pour fuel on the fire.
According to our new analysis Planet Wreckers: Global North Countries Fueling the Fire Since the Paris Agreement, just four Global North countries—the United States, Canada, Australia, and Norway—are responsible for nearly all of the global increase in oil and gas production since the Paris Agreement. While the rest of the world combined has reduced production by 2%, these four countries have increased theirs by almost 40%. The US alone accounts for over 90% of that increase, making it the undisputed Planet-Wrecker-in-Chief.
These rich countries undermine the commitments made at COP28, when the world agreed to transition away from fossil fuels. Instead of leading the phaseout, they are leading the expansion: approving new oil fields, subsidizing fossil fuel companies, and blocking fair global finance rules that could help the Global South transition to clean energy.
The fossil fuel era is ending. The only question is whether it ends fast enough, and fair enough, to give us a livable future.
It’s immoral and arguably criminal. Keeping the 1.5°C limit in reach requires ending fossil fuel expansion and rapidly phasing out oil, gas, and coal production and use. The legal case for this has also been recently bolstered by international courts, including the International Court of Justice. Every new well drilled in Texas, Alberta, or the North Sea is a violation of international law and a betrayal of climate justice.
Meanwhile, the same countries hoard wealth while delivering pennies in climate finance. Since 2015, all Global North governments have provided only $280 billion in public climate finance, a fraction of what’s needed, and five times less than the $1.3 trillion in profits their oil and gas corporations made in the same period. The money to fund a just transition exists, but it’s in the wrong hands.
At COP30, leaders have a choice: continue shielding fossil fuel interests, or stand with the majority of the world demanding a fast, fair, and funded transition away from oil, gas, and coal, and lead on phasing out first and fastest as their historical responsibility demands.
That transition has already begun. From the first global conference on fossil fuel phaseout announced by Colombia, to countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America developing people-centered renewable energy pathways, momentum is building. The question now is whether the biggest polluters will step up or be remembered as the governments that chose profit over survival.
Belém must be the moment when leaders stop hiding behind greenwashing and false solutions. That means rejecting carbon offsets and “net zero” distractions; kicking fossil fuel lobbyists out of the talks; and putting justice, workers, and public finance at the center of the just transition. It also means solidarity with people fighting fossil-fueled violence, from Gaza to the Niger Delta, and demanding accountability for those who profit from destruction.
The fossil fuel era is ending. The only question is whether it ends fast enough, and fair enough, to give us a livable future.
If the United States, Canada, Australia, and Norway continue to block progress, they will not only be remembered as the Planet Wreckers, they will be held accountable, by people, by history, and by the law.
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COP30: Climate Course Correction or Another Collision Course?
With 2024 confirmed as the hottest year ever on record, the US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, and the massive financial shortfalls left by lackluster negotiations at COP29, this year's climate talks are pivotal.
Nov 09, 2025
The 30th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change will take place in Belém, a remote, underdeveloped, and poor region of the Brazilian Amazon.
Delegates from over 190 countries, NGOs, Indigenous representatives, and Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, alongside COP President André Corrêa do Lago, will all participate in this year's high-stakes climate negotiations.
Missed Targets and Weak Ambition: It's Now or Never
With 2024 confirmed as the hottest year ever on record, the US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, and the massive financial shortfalls left by lackluster negotiations at COP29, this year's climate talks are pivotal.
A 2024 report by the UN revealed that current policies put the planet on track to reach a catastrophic 3.1°C warming by 2100 (Emissions Gap Report). This scenario would expose 600 million people to flooding, reduce food yields by half, cause severe water shortages, lead to insurmountable habitat and biodiversity loss, create month-long brutal heatwaves and wildfires, heighten the risks of insect-borne diseases, and profoundly deepen inequalities.
Progress will be stalled unless the global climate investment gap can be closed and pledges are finally turned into real investments.
At last year's summit, it was agreed that at least $1.3 trillion in annual climate finance would be mobilized for developing countries by 2035. This funding is intended to support a just transition to clean energy, climate adaptation policies, and addressing loss and damage from climate change.
Tackling the climate crisis is IMPOSSIBLE without adequate funding. Since President Donald Trump took office, at least $18 billion has been stripped from climate finance—6% of the new global $300 billion annual target. The current pace of financing is entirely insufficient to meet the agreed-upon goals.
At COP30, all members of the UNCCC are expected to publish their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), outlining their national plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to climate impacts.
The NDC Synthesis Report was released in October 2025, which, according to Melanie Robinson, global climate, economics, and finance program director for World Resources Institute, "lays bare a frightening gap between what governments have promised and what is needed to protect people and planet."
Progress will be stalled unless the global climate investment gap can be closed and pledges are finally turned into real investments. This will prove even more difficult as militarization grips the planet. NATO has increased its spending commitments to an unprecedented 5% of GDP, and the EU Special Debts for Rearmament will further siphon money into warmongering, posturing, and weapons stockpiling.
A new initiative, the Global Ethical Stocktake, launched by the President of Brazil, Lula da Silva, and the United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres, aims to integrate ethical considerations into climate negotiations, an aspect that has previously been omitted.
Jaded by a lack of action in previous COPs, former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, along with other influential figures such as Mary Robinson and Christiana Figueres, labelled the current climate policy process "no longer fit for purpose."
Finally, a COP President with Credentials: André Corrêa do Lago
This year's COP president holds higher hopes than others. He is a veteran climate diplomat and serves as the current secretary for climate, energy, and environment at the Brazilian Ministry of External Affairs.
He has worked with Brazil's diplomatic corps since 1982 and has represented Brazil in similar negotiations, including as chief negotiator at Rio+20, COP28, and COP29.
In a positive initial call to action, he has called on all stakeholders in the climate negotiations process to "act decisively in the face of climate urgency through an ambitious and integrated Action Agenda at COP30."
A COP Built on Deforestation: Brazil Controversy
The location of this year's climate summit is highly contentious. Destroying thousands of acres of rainforest to make way for a new four-lane highway, which is intended to ease congestion for COP visitors, is a blatant contradiction. This is the very environment Brazil has pledged to protect.
Rather than addressing the concerns, classic greenwashing terms like 'sustainable" are being used to describe the 8-mile road. Cutting through the Amazon rainforest, the road will fragment the ecosystem, disrupt the movement of wildlife, affect the livelihoods of local communities, and be inaccessible to those who live on either side of the highway. It will, however, have bike lanes and solar-powered lights!
The lack of infrastructure in the area means that more than 30 large-scale construction projects will be taking place to accommodate and prepare for the 50,000 expected visitors. The port is being redeveloped for cruise ships, and $81 million will be spent on expanding the airport to double its current capacity.
Emissions, emissions, emissions!
The expansion of the fossil fuel industry seriously contradicts the Brazilian government's climate narrative and threatens the country's credibility at COP30.
After three climate conferences in countries with restrictions on protests, Amazonian leaders and social movements are wary that their participation may be discounted and silenced. Since February, Indigenous groups have been occupying the Secretary of Education and blocking roads that cut through their territories. The protests have already begun.
Brazil is also no climate leader, but rather an empire built on oil. Its vast mining, fossil fuel, and agribusiness sectors mean that Brazil is responsible for more than 4% of total global emissions. In 2023, it emitted 2.3 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases, making Brazil the world's fifth worst polluter.
In this country of deep inequalities, the poor are disproportionately affected by climate change, including sea-level rise; heatwaves; and heavy, erratic rainfalls.
Just weeks before the conference begins, a new bill to dismantle Brazil's environmental license framework was passed. It eases restrictions on oil exploration and road development in the Amazon. A self-licensing process enables fossil fuel and construction companies to act with impunity and avoid the need for impact studies and mitigation measures.
Immediately after the bill change, Petrobras, the country's majority state-owned, scandal-ridden oil company, began drilling for oil a mere 200 miles away from Belém. The license was previously denied due to the risk of widespread biodiversity loss in this fragile ecosystem in the event of a spill. A new report reveals that since 2024, big banks have provided $2 billion in new financing for oil and gas in the Amazon.
Estimates suggest that up to 60 billion barrels of oil may exist in the Brazilian Amazon. If burned, they could emit 24 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide—more than Brazil's emissions over the past 11 years. The expansion of the fossil fuel industry seriously contradicts the Brazilian government's climate narrative and threatens the country's credibility at COP30.
Good COP, Bad COP
"Climate is our biggest war," said Ana Toni, chief executive of COP30.
Hopes are high. Expectations are low. Change is happening, it is just painfully slow.
We need this to be the "delivery COP." One thing is for sure, COP30 will be make or break for people, our precious flora and fauna, and our planet as a whole.
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