As the Glasgow COP26 meetings ended on Sunday, it quickly became clear that the region that will suffer the worst economic and social effects of rising temperatures—and that can least afford to cope with challenges climate change will bring—gained very little in Glasgow. Little agreement was reached on how to compensate African countries for the damage that centuries of fossil fuels and other emissions in rich countries will have on Africa’s development prospects owing to the current and future effects of climate change. The unfairness of the current situation—where today’s rich countries reached the highest levels of material welfare the world has ever seen primarily by harnessing cheap energy from fossil fuels, but most of the negative consequences of this strategy will fall on the world’s poorest countries—demands compensatory financing from the Global North to the Global South, especially Africa.
Africa’s youth lost out in Glasgow (Louise Fox, Brookings)
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