Bali: rich nations must pay up

Rich countries have paid only $67m into a UN fund designed to help the world's poorest countries adapt to climate change, according to a new report published today by develoment charity Oxfam. Although this may sound a lot, in fact it's less than what Americans spend on suntan lotion each month, and only a tiny fraction of the real amount needed. Oxfam estimates that the true cost of successful adaptation is likely to be at least $50 billion a year, and far more if global greenhouse-gas emissions are not cut fast enough.

International funding efforts to date have been woeful. In the year that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued its direst warnings to date of the impacts of climate change on vulnerable developing countries, the rich and high-polluting countries increased their contribution to the Least Developed Countries Fund (LDCF) for urgent adaptation needs by a mere $43m.

Previous history suggests that rich countries are very unlikely to provide the scale of adaptation finance needed on a voluntary basis. This makes it imperative that one of the outcomes from Bali is a commitment to identify and establish new finance-raising mechanisms, so that vulnerable communities in developing countries will have the resources and support they need to protect themselves from the worst impacts of climate change.

Read the report: Financing adaptation: why the UN's Bali Climate Conference must mandate the search for new funds