Poor countries demand financial aid for climate damage

• Poor nations demand hundreds of billions of dollars per year from wealthy countries

• World powers have failed to provide $100 billion as promised earlier

Poor countries are demanding climate change finance from wealthy nations for the increasing damage caused due to global warming resulting in cyclones, droughts and floods in their area.

At the U.N. climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, developing countries demand extra hundreds of billions of dollars per year from wealthy countries as they fail to provide $100 billion as promised earlier.

The earlier promised funds were offered as poorer countries were least responsible for climate change and also to help them to transition from fossil fuels.

Harjeet Singh, an advisor with Climate Action Network, representing developing nations said, “We’ve been too slow on mitigation and adaption, and so now we have this big and growing problem of loss and damage.”

Damage to poor countries

Singh also said the cost of damage from climate change could bankrupt developing or poor countries, if world powers do not provide some financial assistance.

Without proper financial aid, poor countries would not be able to contribute to the fight against climate change, he added.

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Singh said that in the official text of the summit agreement, negotiations related to “loss and damage” were discussed, which faced resistance from United States, the European Union and other developed countries.

Head of German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Juergen Zattler, said a discussion on a separate fund for “loss and damage” from mitigation and adaption is premature.

“I don't think the discussion is at that stage yet,” he told reporters at the Glasgow summit.

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“We do not know yet what loss and damage actually is, how it is different from adaptation. We are poking in the dark here.”

Countries which are most affected by climate change have been raising the issue of who would pay for climate change damage for decades now, when impacts of global warming were not significantly visible.

Picture Credits: Reuters