Verbatim report of proceedings

Wednesday, 24 November 2021 - Strasbourg

Outcome of the COP26 in Glasgow (debate)

  Ivan Štefanec (PPE). – Mr President, protecting the environment for future generations is one of the key challenges ahead of us. The most challenging task will be to find ways to protect the environment in a way that will boost our economy, employment and social care.

The environmental agenda is stronger every day and I believe that the organisation of the Glasgow Summit is really a success of our European policy. This is the most important message. There are also three good messages, in my view. The first one is that the Glasgow Agreement has been signed by 151 countries. The second one is that countries also agreed to a robust process to develop a new and larger climate finance goal to come into effect after 2025. Thirdly, finance. There is a significant milestone to address this issue. The Adaptation Fund reached an unprecedented level of contributions, with new pledges for USD 356 million that represent almost three times its mobilisation targets for 2022.

On the other hand, there are very high expectations and there are still challenges remaining. The first one is coal. Many countries will phase out coal by 2030, but the world’s largest users of the fuel, like China, India and the United States of America, will not do so. Secondly, transportation. Better investment for sustainable transport modes was not forced in Glasgow. There is still a lack of focus on public transport and cycling. Thirdly, fossil fuels. The subsidisation of fossil fuels, the largest source of global greenhouse gas emissions, was opposed by several countries with large fossil-fuel based economic sectors.

Glasgow clearly showed that the democratic world is trying to address and solve the issues, while the non-democratic one is still waiting. We can really be leaders and represent the green transformation for the rest of the world.