Briefs

False Economy: Financial wizardry won't pay the bill for a fair and sustainable future

2023 could be a turning point. A year when the world emerges from unprecedented crises, and governments deliver progressive reforms that build a brighter future for all, and for the planet.

But despite the dire economic situation facing the poorest countries today, and much political discussion of the trillions needed to tackle poverty, inequality and climate change, there is no indication that rich countries are willing to pay the true price of a fair and sustainable future.

In fact, there is a risk that rich-country Finance Ministers meeting in Washington this week will celebrate progress on reforms that deliver just 0.1% of the climate and social spending gap in low- and middle-income countries (LICs and MICs) between now and 2030. And that they will do so through financial wizardry that doesn’t cost them a cent.

This briefing spells out the dire reality and the true scale of the financing needed in low- and middle-income countries, the inadequacy of the solutions currently under discussion, and the action rich countries could be taking to raise the trillions of dollars that are truly needed.

Speaking Up: The role of women in building peace in Yemen

This paper brings the voices of Yemeni women forward. Women were active in the 2011 protests, influencing political developments at key junctures. However, subsequent armed conflicts militarized the political environment and pushed forward a more limited religious agenda that saw more and more women systematically marginalized in the process.

This paper outlines these major trends and offers some key recommendations to the government and wider international community to better support women’s participation in peace negotiations and involvement in the Yemeni political arena.

Revising the EITI Standard: Critical Updates to Ensure Impact and Relevance

The Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) is at a crossroads. Can it deliver on its core objectives to counter corruption and help citizens and communities ensure a fair deal from mining, oil, and gas projects? Or will the EITI Standard remain too weak to fully address these challenges?

Survival of the Richest

How we must tax the super-rich now to fight inequality

Carbon Billionaires: The investment emissions of the world's richest people

The world’s richest people emit huge and unsustainable amounts of carbon and, unlike ordinary people, 50% to 70% of their emissions result from their investments. New analysis of the investments of 125 of the world’s richest billionaires shows that on average they are emitting 3 million tonnes a year, more than a million times the average for someone in the bottom 90% of humanity.

The study also finds billionaire investments in polluting industries such as fossil fuels and cement are double the average for the S&P 500 group of companies. Billionaires hold extensive stakes in many of the world’s largest and most powerful corporations, which gives them the power to influence the way these companies act. Governments must hold them to account, legislating to compel corporates and investors to reduce carbon emissions, enforcing more stringent reporting requirements and imposing new taxation on wealth and investments in polluting industries.

Climate Finance Short-changed: The real value of the $100 billion commitment in 2019–2020

In 2009, high-income countries promised to provide $100bn a year in climate finance to low- and middle-income countries by 2020. They have failed to keep this promise. Their official reports claim that the climate finance they provided and mobilized reached $83.3bn in 2020, but Oxfam estimates the real value was only around a third of that reported.

Immediate action is needed to restore trust in the $100bn goal and ensure that the provision of climate finance is fair and robust. For too long, most high-income countries have persisted in counting the wrong things in the wrong way. There are too many loans, too much debt, too few grants, too little for adaptation, and too much dishonest and misleading accounting.

This paper sets out recommendations for action at COP27 and beyond to rectify these issues, restore trust in climate finance and stop the world’s poorest climate-vulnerable countries and communities being short-changed of the climate finance they urgently need, and to which they are entitled.