It's time for the UN climate summit to end climate inequality!
We read about it in the newspapers, we see it on the news - about how the climate crisis is affecting us all. But the issue of climate change is not one that we can just turn a blind eye to or turn off the TV in the hope that someone else will solve the problem. The climate crisis takes different forms depending on where we are geographically on the world map, but it affects us all.
The climate crisis is causing extreme weather in the form of severe storms and cyclones, droughts, heat waves and floods, which means, among other things, unpredictable and failed harvests, threatened food security, increased food prices and, as a result, increased hunger in many parts of the world. In Sweden, we have also been hit in recent years by forest fires, farmers testifying that they can no longer make a living from their farming because severe climate change is destroying their crops, and this summer many around the country were hit by floods.
No one is immune to climate change, but it is the people living in poverty who are most affected. This is despite the fact that the poorest half of the world's population - 3.5 billion people - are responsible for only 10% of the world's carbon emissions. This is what we at Oxfam refer to as climate inequality.
We at Oxfam are pressing governments and policymakers to take greater responsibility for the climate crisis: the onus is on them to do more to reduce emissions and climate inequality. Oxfam is also working to influence the climate issue at the international level, including to provide more resources for climate finance to the least developed countries.
Sweden and other rich countries with historically high emissions must take responsibility for reducing emissions and reducing the suffering caused by climate change and enabling adaptation. The climate crisis risks further deepening poverty and increasing hunger and starvation. Sweden's decision-makers must act immediately and comprehensively.
On the occasion of the climate summit currently taking place in Glasgow from 1-12 November 2021, Oxfam Secretary General Suzanne Standfast has signed a letter together with 36 other organisations. The letter is addressed to three Nordic aid ministers. The letter raises hopes for Nordic leadership on the issue of climate finance to low and middle income countries and suggests how these ambitions can be made concrete.
On 9 November 2021, Oxfam will release a new climate inequality report. You can read previous Climate Equality Reports here: Confronting Carbon Inequality, Climate Finance Shadow Report 2020, Removing Carbon Now, Forced From Home, Who Takes The Heat?.