“We know that COP will not solve the climate crisis especially when the governments are offering false solutions to the negotiating table

Belém, BRAZIL – Attending the conference of the parties (COP) can be overwhelming.

Figuring out directions going from one event to another. Seeing an overwhelming crowd entering the venue – some are part of the negotiating party, some are members of the civil society organizations, some are journalists who chase stories or whose reportage is to follow the development in the past 30 years of negotiations. The list is long. 

Reo Iñigo, 24, a registered medical technologist, experienced this. “While this is not the first international work that I attended, the scale of COP was on a different level. It was overwhelming, there are different languages, different agendas,” he told Bulatlat in an online interview. He is the advocacy and policy reform officer of Samahan Operasyong Sagip-Philippines or SOS Philippines. 

It was Iñigo’s first time attending the COP. He was among the medical professionals bringing the issue of health and its interconnection to the worsening climate crisis. 

For young climate activists like Rachelle Junsay, 23, attending COP is nerve-wracking because stakes are higher. “Compared to other international events that I have participated in, COP is a big event where negotiations are happening,” she told Bulatlat. She is the national coordinator of Youth Advocates for Climate Action Philippines (YACAP). 

For these two Gen Zs who are among the thousands who went to Belém, COP30 was a space dominated by powerful nations who can afford travel costs. Yet both of them also believed that civil society must keep on showing up to make sure frontline voices remain impossible to ignore, even in a space that rarely listens. 

Rachelle Junsay and Reo Iñigo during the Global March for Health and Climate.

For climate activists, this year’s COP was crucial. Called the COP of implementation, states should have taken more concrete action on agreements signed by the governments under the Paris Agreement, an international treaty adopted by the countries participating in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 2015. But fossil fuel and big agribusiness lobbyists also made their attendance at the COP with 1,600 fossil fuel and more than 300 big agribusiness lobbyists. At the end of the COP30, the UNFCCC failed to come up with a roadmap to transition away from fossil fuel. 

Read: No climate justice in COP30

Exclusive 

Like in past COPs, civil society organizations (CSOs) asserted to make their voices heard by holding protests or short actions inside what they call the Blue Zone or area dedicated for CSOs. This is aside from different side events held also within the area to discuss with climate activists and governments.

But this is not without any hiccups along the way. In the past COPs, CSOs have raised the shrinking space in the venue, the stricter rules, and tight guidelines on what to say or not to say in the Blue Zone. 

Read: Sidelined during #COP28, advocates still push for climate action

This year’s venue was another issue for the CSOs, especially those who have meager funds, to transport members who would be attending the COP. For this year, COP was held at the gateway of the Amazon, in Belem, Brazil. For Filipino climate activists, a roundtrip plane ticket from the Philippines to Brazil costs about $2,000. 

“I wouldn’t be able to attend the COP if not for the support of partners and organizations that also support our advocacies and campaign,” Iñigo said. This was also the same with Junsay. 

“How can we say that this is inclusive when travelling alone is costly. And this is not only because the venue is the Amazon, this was also true in the past COP venue,” Junsay said.

“How can a farmer, a fisherfolk, those who were victims of disasters participate in a summit like the COP if they cannot afford transportation? In fact, they are the ones who should be at the COP,” she said, stressing that for a grassroot organization, spending thousands for an event is not their priority. 

“Even the accreditation itself isn’t really their priority. Their priority is their everyday food. So those kinds of things make it really not inclusive — it becomes exclusive to CSOs that can afford to go to the COP. I think that’s really the case, especially this year, since the venue is in Belém. The accommodations are expensive, the flights are expensive — people were really divided because of economic reasons,” Junsay added. 

Iñigo noted the presence of the military in the COP venue. “The presence of the military was increasing everyday,” he said. 

“We are in a space to engage with the community. It is the soldiers who actually harm environmental defenders and execute war that pollutes the planet and yet you see them in this kind of space. It’s so ironic,” Iñigo said.

Highlight 

Activists said that the huge protest during the Global Day of Action on November 15 is the first protest outside the UNFCCC venue since COP26 which was held in Glasgow, Scotland in 2021. The succeeding COP in Egypt, Dubai and Azerbaijan had stricter policieson demonstrations. Thus on that day, both Iñigo and Junsay witnessed the convergence of thousands of people from around the world demanding climate justice – a highlight for many climate activists and advocates who were fortunate to go to Brazil.

“I saw the support for one another on that day. People were sharing food and water. I felt the solidarity,” Iñigo said. 

“It was definitely the walk!” Junsay exclaimed when asked about the highlight of her participation at the COP. But on a serious note, she said, it was her encounter with the “brave climate warriors.”

This year, there were two other parallel events organized by different groups. One is the COP do povo or the People’s COP, a space for mobilizations and discussions outside the UNFCCC. Here different CSOs also organized side events where they discussed and shared stories of struggles in their own countries. This was organized for the COP30 event. There is also the People’s Summit where side events were also held outside of the UNFCCC venue.  

Iñigo and Junsay attended events where they served as resource speakers in both spaces. It was tiring especially with Belém’s climate which is the same as the Philippines. 

“What I really appreciate with this experience was meeting the climate warriors and hearing their stories of resistance,” Junsay said. 

“Because that’s something that doesn’t really get much spotlight in the Philippines. We already have so many problems of our own. But hearing stories of resistance from Palestine, from the Sahara, from Madagascar, and other people I met — I think it has a big impact in lifting the spirit to keep fighting back,” Junsay said. “Especially in a space like COP, which is very dominated by false solutions and profit-centered fake NGOs (non government organizations). It’s grounding that even in spaces like COP, you get to meet many people who share the same advocacy as you.”

Militarism 

Iñigo and Junsay are under the banner of the People’s Rising for Climate Justice, a global movement demanding climate action from the global north. Among the campaigns they brought in Brazil is their demand for climate justice and for nations to strengthen resistance against imperialism. 

“It’s really about exposing climate impacts, exposing the blatant militarism in almost every nation across the world, exposing the US-led wars of aggression, which are the main roots of why the climate crisis keeps worsening—why COP looks the way it does, where even though it’s a conference of parties that is supposed to solve the climate crisis, the ones sitting at the negotiation tables are global north countries, fossil-fuel lobbyists, imperialist nations, and the people who are truly affected are not given a voice,” Junsay said.

Climate activists are criticizing the COP for not bringing up contentious issues into the negotiating table. An example is militarism, considered the planet’s major polluter. According to Scientists for Global Responsibility, an estimate of 6% of global emissions are from the world’s militaries and the industries that provide their equipment. 

But despite this, the Paris Agreement and the COP does not include in the negotiation the issue of militarism and military emissions. Junsay said that militaries are not even required to report or cut emissions.   

“In a space where there are many issues that are being discussed such as just transition, loss and damage, climate finance, gender justice, among others, militarism must also be talked about and we did this in many engagements here – inside and outside the COP venue,” she said. 

Showing up

The COP has been widely criticized for its lack of action, insufficient climate goals, lack of binding enforcement of agreements, the heavy influence of the fossil fuel industry while those in the frontline communities are being sidelined. Climate activists are questioning, will COP ever bring concrete results? Junsay thinks no. 

“We know that COP will not solve the climate crisis especially when the governments are offering false solutions to the negotiating table,” Junsay said, adding that it is crucial that people’s voices are included in coming up with solutions. 

She said that despite these, CSOs must still make their presence in the COP space especially when there are contentious issues that are not being discussed or intentionally ignored.  

“It’s also important that CSOs are present in a space where the first world countries are exploiting for their self-interests,” Iñigo said.

He stressed that even though the space is limited, the critical voice of the CSOs are important. “CSOs bring along with them the solutions to the climate crisis which they have gathered from the members of their communities. We cannot just let the global north totally dominate that space.”

“Even before, the COP’s objectives were never genuinely about climate solutions. But we still participate because we need to be in that space. We need to disrupt that space. Because if we’re not there, it will only be used even more by the global north countries to monopolize climate solutions for profit, not for people and the planet,” Junsay said. “And our purpose in going to the COP is never really to align ourselves with the UNFCCC, but to strengthen international solidarity—that is the primary goal.”

Despite the exhaustion, Iñigo said that what kept him energized was the solidarity. “The solidarity is energizing knowing that there are many people from around the world who are pushing for meaningful change.” (DAA)