Earth Today | Teamwork key to better environmental outcomes – Report
Published:Thursday | March 6, 2025 | 12:08 AM
THE 2024 Annual Report of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) presents a gentle reminder of the many miles left to travel in the effort to overcome the triple planetary crisis of climate change, nature loss and pollution.
At the same time, the report, titled ‘We are all in this together’, provides a not-so-subtle nudge for countries to collaborate more among themselves but also with the UNEP to realise better outcomes.
“The reality is that environmental multilateralism is sometimes messy and arduous. But even in complex geopolitical times, collaboration across borders and across our differences is the only option to protect the foundation of humanity’s existence – Planet Earth,” writes UNEP executive director Inger Andersen in the report.
“UNEP calls for a dramatic uptick in ambition and action in the coming year. Nations must promise and deliver huge cuts to greenhouse gas emissions in the next round of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) … They must start delivering the necessary finance for climate adaptation and for desertification and biodiversity action. And they must work towards agreeing on a strong instrument to end plastic pollution before UN Environment Assembly-7 in December,” she added.
The report goes on to chronicle the UNEP’s achievements over the last year – from the production of its series of research reports offering solutions to the climate crisis to the provision of technical support to some 64 countries in their first-time reporting on NDCs and 35 others with “advancing efforts to accelerate low-carbon development through initiatives drawing on over US$200 million in grant funding from the global environment facility”.
UNEP also supported 60 low- and middle-income countries, among them Antigua and Barbuda, India, and Kenya, as they moved to progress the transition to electric vehicles.
“The work is part of a larger UNEP effort to back electric mobility in the Global South, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution. The effort comes amid a rapid transition towards electric mobility. In 2023, electric cars accounted for 18 per cent of new car sales globally, a nearly tenfold increase from five years earlier,” the UNEP said in its Annual Report for 2024.
UNEP also progressed efforts under the Clean Air Initiative, supported countries with their climate adaptation and addressed financing of a low-carbon future – with the UNEP Finance Initiative (UNEP FI) continuing to support “a large network of banks, insurers and investors in their efforts to address climate change”.
“The Net-Zero Banking Alliance, convened by UNEP FI, with more than 140 members across over 40 countries, saw the number of the lenders setting independent targets for reducing the carbon footprint of their financing efforts across power generation, real estate, transport and other sectors reach well over 100,” the report revealed.
“Around two-thirds of members surveyed had put in place policies for coal, and oil and gas. One-third had policies on land use and deforestation. The alliance’s members agreed to expand their net-zero targets to include capital market activities, the largest source of ‘financed emissions’ for many banks,” it added.
The Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance, the report said, also increased to 89 members, which together have close to US$10 trillion under management.
“In 2023, alliance members channelled US$555 billion into climate-related solutions, up from US$100 billion in 2020. Since the alliance’s launch in 2019, members have driven down the emissions in their portfolios by roughly six per cent annually,” the UNEP boasted.
UNEP also embraced artificial intelligence to help to solve Earth’s woes; looked at conserving freshwater ecosystems; championed the greater inclusion of women in environmental decision-making and benefits sharing from resilience building; and tackled plastics pollution.
Ultimately, it said that the year brought both successes and disappointments, and the recognition that “humanity is not out of the woods”.
“Temperatures are rising. Ecosystems are disappearing, and pollution remains a deadly threat. These are global problems that require global solutions. The world must pull together to build a fairer, more sustainable planet. And UNEP will be there to support countries every step of the way,” Andersen wrote in the Annual Report.