COP 30 opened in Belém last week with a clear message: the era of half-measures is over. Climate change is here, devastating communities and driving up costs, but solutions are within reach. Clean energy is surging, resilience saves lives, and cooperation can still bend the curve further.
“This is the moment to match opportunity with urgency,” said Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, calling for a decisive defeat of climate denial and faster action to keep the 1.5°C goal alive.
As negotiations begin at the annual two-week summit, held this year in a city at the mouth of the Amazon, UN climate chief Simon Stiell urged delegates not to “squabble,” but to focus on turning ambition into action.
“Your job here is not to fight one another—your job here is to fight this climate crisis, together,” he said. “This is the growth story of the 21st century—the economic transformation of our age.”
A sense of cautious optimism marked the first day of COP30, following the announcement that dozens of new national climate plans—known as NDCs – pushed the tally to 113 countries now committed to curbing global warming. Together, they represent nearly 70 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions—a significant step forward in the race to keep temperatures in check.
A preliminary assessment by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which convenes the yearly COPs, suggests these pledges could cut emissions by 12 percent by 2035. It’s progress, but not yet enough to guarantee the 1.5°C goal. The challenge now is turning promises into action at a pace that matches the scale of the crisis.
In his opening remarks, Stiell said that commitments and agreements made by successive COPs were beginning to show impact, with the global emissions curve now starting to bend downward.
He acknowledged that much work remains but highlighted that Belém – “home to the mouth of the mighty Amazon River”–can serve as inspiration.
“The Amazon is not a single river, but a vast system sustained by more than a thousand tributaries,” he said. “In the same way, implementation of COP outcomes must be driven by multiple streams of international cooperation.” UN News
Stiell warned that “no national plan can solve this problem on its own,” stressing that no country can afford the economic shock of climate disasters that slash GDP by double digits.
“It makes neither economic nor political sense,” he said, “to stand idle while catastrophic droughts destroy crops and drive food prices sky-high.”
He called it “unforgivable” that extreme weather continues to claim millions of lives when proven solutions already exist. UN News
