Donald Trump, tariffs and wars drain funds from climate action, warns Brazil

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The threat of a trade war and rising security tensions alongside the US withdrawal from the Paris climate accord will “drain” resources away from efforts to curb global warming, leading to “civilisation doom”, Brazil’s environment minister warned.

“It is clear that the withdrawal of the Paris agreement of the world’s second-largest emitter, the world’s largest economic and technological power, is a loss. We cannot be deniers — it is a loss,” Marina Silva said.

The confluence of the US withdrawal from climate action, new trade tariffs and the resurgence of geopolitical conflicts would have a “triple negative effect” on climate action.

“They may drain resources and they also may hamper the environment of confidence and trust among parties. We have a triple negative effect because the less action we see, the less money we see, resulting in less co-operation across countries,” she said.

This increased the responsibility of countries like Brazil, South Africa, India, China, the EU and the UK, said Silva, who was born in the Amazon. “We will all have to continue climate action.”

Brazil will host the UN COP 30, the world’s most important climate talks in November this year in the Amazon port of Belém.

Countries are now expected to submit updated climate plans for 2035 by the time of the Belém summit, after only a handful met the February deadline set under the Paris agreement, including the UK, Japan and Brazil.

The incoming UN COP30 president André Corrêa do Lago followed on Silva’s remarks, by sending a letter to countries on Monday stressing that the talks in Belém must shift from negotiations to action.

He wrote that previous summits had provided a “complete rule book” for the Paris agreement. “We need a new era beyond negotiating talks: we must help put into practice what we have agreed,” he said.

Some scientists already calculate that the world will not meet the ideal Paris accord goal of limiting the global average temperature rise to no more than 1.5C from pre-industrial times. The UN has forecast the rise will reach 2.9C this century unless action is taken to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Silva said the almost 200 countries that were signatories would need to either “implement” their climate pledges or “will face an unthinkable, civilisational doom”.

She was speaking on the sidelines of the World Sustainable Development Summit in New Delhi, where India’s environment minister Bhupender Yadav reiterated the goal of the world’s third-largest polluter for net zero emissions by 2070.

India is among those countries that have not upgraded their targets, as required by the Paris agreement process.

Developing countries such as India and Brazil face a daunting task in finding ways to plug what is estimated by an independent group of economists to be a $1tn gap in international climate change funding

At the UN COP29 in Baku in November, almost 200 countries agreed that wealthy nations would take the lead in providing at least $300bn in climate finance by 2035 to help developing countries shift to green energy and cope with climate change. But Silva said that may now be in jeopardy.

“This is very serious, because we need $1.3tn to be able to make the necessary efforts for this transition. We are starting from $300bn, but even that is not guaranteed,” she said.

Additional reporting by Attracta Mooney in London