2021, the year that reactivated environmental ambition

The year that is now ending has allowed us to recover the initiative to formalize new environmental agreements, most of them crystallized in the COP26 that was held in Glasgow during the month of November, after a 2020 at half gas due to the restrictions generated by COVID-19.

In fact, the climate summit was delayed a year due to the international alarm over the expansion of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which, incidentally, has made it possible to show for the first time in a very graphic way the link between the health of the planet and that of human beings.

Several studies published in recent months have insisted on this link, describing how environmental problems such as the destruction of ecosystems or industrial exploitation in poor conditions of all kinds of species helped its spread, with the consequent increase in zoonotic diseases, capable of jumping from animals to man and vice versa.

For this reason, the commitment to stop and reverse deforestation between now and 2030 is considered a success, in a document sealed during COP26 – the climate summit held in Glasgow during the first half of November – by the governments of a hundred countries in whose territory is concentrated 85% of the forests of the planet.

Among them was Brazil, whose Minister of the Environment, Joaquim Leite, also made a private promise that his country will eliminate illegal deforestation by 2028, a problem that affects the largest forest reserve on the planet: the Amazon.

Another 45 countries agreed at the same summit to take measures to move towards more sustainable agriculture and soil management, while various financial institutions and agri-food companies announced investments in livestock and soy production programs to prevent deforestation in South America.

Despite the delay in the convocation and development of COP26, only eight countries -among them, Spain- of the almost 200 participants arrived with “lyou homework done”, That is to say, with its climate objectives embodied in a law.

However, Glasgow was the scene of interesting initiatives, including the commitment of the United States – which has returned to the “environmental arena” with Joe Biden in the White House – and China, two of the most polluting countries in the world, to “reinforce the Climate Actions ”and to achieve the objectives of the Paris Agreement throughout the current decade.

This joint statement by Washington and Beijing was received with satisfaction, but their real intentions of collaboration have been called into question at the first of changes, after the announcement in early December of the North American diplomatic boycott of the Winter Games organized by China, within the atmosphere of “cold War“Which seems to have settled between both capitals.

Beyond the final agreement of COP26, decaffeinated at the last minute by the surprise intervention of India that, with a single word, changed its final meaning – “reduction” instead of “elimination”Of coal as an energy source- the sectoral agreements were initialed by groups of countries and regions, not globally.

Most of them seek to hinder the use of fossil fuels by supporting renewable energies instead, although it will be necessary to see how many are fulfilled and to what extent, given the antecedents of previous agreements.

These include the end of the granting of new licenses to exploit oil and gas in territories under the jurisdiction of the signatories, the elimination of combustion vehicles by 2035, the creation of fleets of electric public buses in Ibero-American countries or the reduction of up to 30% in methane emissions, a gas with a great impact on the greenhouse effect, although less known than CO2.

For the rest, the EU is consolidating itself as one of the main environmental leaders, with a European Commission that wants to dedicate a good part of the so-called Next Generation funds – to alleviate the economic damage caused by the coronavirus – to the ecological transition, including a 30 % to the fight against climate change.

One of the great unresolved issues continues to be the raising of sufficient financial capital to support the ecological transition of developing countries that, according to calculations that have been handled since COP21 in Paris, should amount to about US $ 100 billion annually (about 88,500 million million euros), a still distant figure, despite progress in this regard.

What was appreciated in 2021 is the growing interest of the financial sector in everything related to the environment, materialized in the signing of up to 450 entities from 45 countries to invest US $ 130 billion -112 billion euros- in the transition to a decarbonized economy in 2050.

In addition, this year the “ola verde”In the economic sector where, from large multinationals to SMEs, they have presented proposals and public plans to improve their environmental impact and their carbon footprint, competing to obtain certificates from both governments and private entities in a process that, according to environmental organizations, has more than “green washThan real commitment.

2022 will be a decisive year to know if the facts corroborate the intentions and if the good wishes or the real problems come true are submerged again, taking advantage of the fact that the next COP27 will be held in the Egyptian town of Sharm el Sheikh, a well-known spa and recreational diver’s paradise.