'Above all a summit of delivery': Developing nations publish their COP26 wishlist

The world's developing countries have urged rich nations to move faster to tackle climate change and meet and exceed their commitment to deliver $100bn a year in climate finance ahead of the vital UN climate talks this autumn.

In a position paper published this week, the Least Developed Countries (LDC) group have set out their key negotiating demands ahead of the COP26 Climate Summit in Glasgow in November.

The group, which represents more than half the world's countries, has called on those nations most responsible for climate change to bring forward and strengthen their national climate plans for cutting emissions, warning that an acceleration in the adoption of credible net zero targets is urgently needed, fronted by those countries the greatest responsibility and capacity for reducing emissions.

The group also called on high emitting countries to accept their responsibility for the climate crisis and deliver on promises to prepare poor countries from the impacts of climate breakdown. "The consequences of the developed world's historical failure to cut their emissions adequately are already resulting in losses and damage for the most vulnerable," the paper warns.

And the LDCs reiterated long-standing calls for richer countries to finally deliver on the promise to provide at least $100bn a year of climate finance to poorer countries between 2020 and 2024, with sums increasing from 2025 onwards. Developed nations should ensure than half of climate finance issued goes towards climate adaptation, the group added.

Climate finance is set to be a flashpoint between richer and poorer countries during negotiations in Glasgow. Despite making the climate finance pledge back in Copenhagen in 2009, richer countries have collectively failed to make good on their climate finance goals.

As summit host, the UK is currently leading a diplomatic push to convince industrialised nations to increase their climate funding commitments so as to ensure the $100bn target is met. But observers have warned the UK government's calls for other nations to increase their contribution have been badly undermined by the Prime Minister's controversial decision to cut the UK's Overseas Development Aid budget - a move that secured Parliamentary approval this week, despite fierce criticism from opposition parties and some Conservative backbenchers.

Today's LDC position paper stresses that COP26 must be "a summit of delivery", providing the moment when governments that signed the Paris Agreement six years ago deliver on their promises.

"The needs of nations most acutely threatened by climate change lie at the heart of the Paris Agreement and indeed of the United Nations climate convention: morally and practically, there can be no successful outcome at COP26 that does not deliver for the most vulnerable across the full range of issues," it states.

As such, the LDC group has urged richer nations to ensure that COP26 sees the full implementation of the Paris Agreement with the rulebook on transparency, carbon trading, and common timeframes finalised "after several summits of stalling".

The wishlist further underscores the diplomatic challenges the UK faces as it seeks to broker an agreement between the broad coalition of developing and industrialised countries that want to see a more ambitious programme of international climate action and the loose group of petrostates, carbon intensive regions, and emerging economies that remain resistant to some of the draft rules contained in the Paris Agreement and wary of setting ambitious decarbonisation targets.

In related news, British-Dutch consumer goods giant Unilever has been confirmed as the latest corporate partner for COP26. The company joins a growing roster of firms that have been brought on by the UK government as 'principal partners' for the conference, including Sky, Sainsbury's, National Grid, Microsoft, and GSK.

Unilever CEO Alan Jope said the company was looking forward to working with the UK government and other partners to "galvanise ambitious commitments from governments and the private sector and to inspire and empower people around the world to take action".

Jope said climate change posed a major threat to Unilever's future and as such urgent action was needed from political and business leaders alike to tackle escalating climate risks. "Without decisive action on a global scale, climate change is the biggest long-term risk to Unilever's business, and I know we are not unique in this," he said. "Taking decisive action to help address climate change is not only important for people and the planet, it's also critical for business."