WIM Negotiation and the US Perspective

Hello everyone! Today I had another exciting day of the COP, and got to learn more about the various parties’ perspectives on the WIM. This morning, I attended a WIM negotiation contact group (see Max’s post for an explanation of this term) where the parties began discussions about how to enhance the WIM. The session began with a welcome and introduction from the two co-facilitators, who then explained the agenda for the meeting: a brief summary of the outcomes from Sunday’s WIM review meeting and the ExeComm report (Execomm is the central body of WIM), an explanation of the WIM negotiation process for this COP, and finally, open interventions from the parties. From what I understand, Sunday’s review was organized by the Secretariat to provide an opportunity for parties to hold preliminary discussions around the effectiveness of the WIM thus far – it was not a formal negotiation, rather a brainstorming session with multiple break-out groups. Today was the first time that the parties were formally negotiating. It was then revealed that the parties would only have two more formal negotiations like today to finish their discussion about the WIM and submit a draft decision on next steps to the appropriate UNFCCC bodies by December 7th. This means that the parties are expected to finish WIM negotiations in two more sessions, one tomorrow, and one the following day. Parties are allowed to meet on their own for ‘informal informals’ in the interim period between formal negotiations, but co-facilitators are not present and observers are not allowed to attend (some LDC members later requested the co-facilitators and the Secretariat be present at these informal informals, TBD if this request will be granted). Though this tight timeline was highly contested by multiple LDC members, it was later revealed by a co-facilitator that these negotiations were only allotted 8 hours of deliberation under the UNFCCC mandate and therefore cannot be altered (for now…we’ll see if something changes towards the end of the week). If no extra time is permitted to negotiate the WIM, I highly doubt the parties will come to a conclusion about the financing facility. Next, the parties were allowed to present their interventions (AKA speeches) on the floor. As expected based on my conversations from yesterday, G77 and China and the LDCs were strong and unified in their push for the establishment of a financing facility. These parties stressed the fact that loss and damage is happening already and that adequate funding is crucial for poorer countries’ survival. The EU and New Zealand, while in agreement with the idea that WIM needed to be improved to better serve developing countries and the LDCs, focused most of their interventions on the successes of the WIM. The session ended 15 minutes late, with multiple parties/countries still waiting to speak, one of which was the US. I left the negotiation eager to hear what the US was planning to say, but luckily I had a meeting scheduled with Farhan Ahktar, the US State Department head negotiator on WIM, only a few hours later (big thank you to Liz Nichols for the connection). I only had about ten minutes to ask him some questions, as negotiators tend to run between a million different meetings at the COP, giving them little time to take a lunch break, let alone chat with an undergrad student. When I asked Ahktar about the US’s stance on the establishment of a financing facility, he said that the US was in favor of using existing funds (like the Adaptation Fund) to support loss and damage, rather than creating an entirely new facility. This opinion is based on two ideas: first, that creating a new funding facility would take too long to implement given the urgency of loss and damage problems (Liz said it could take up to a decade) and second, that the kinds of funding needs from loss and damage would be eligible for coverage under other existing funding mechanisms. Ahktar added that the US simply could not subscribe to unlimited liability and compensation for loss and damage. A brief note: the US only agreed to sign on to the creation of the WIM in 2013 once a sentence was added about the WIM NOT creating a basis for liability and compensation, so it’s clear that developed countries have been avoiding direct payment to vulnerable nations for years; this is not a new conversation. Ahktar said that the US definitely wants to support the LDCs and other vulnerable nations to become more resilient and able to address the impacts of loss and damage, but that this support would need to materialize through the use of existing funding mechanisms and through the strengthening of other aspects of the WIM. I am excited to hear how all of this gets translated into more formal negotiation language tomorrow morning when the US gets its turn to speak. 

In sum, I’ve now got two pretty clear opinions on the need, or lack thereof, for a new financial facility under WIM. I am working on setting up another meeting with the negotiator for the LDCs later this week to ask the question: can loss and damage funding actually be covered under existing funding mechanisms? If yes, why is a new facility needed? If not, what other factors are keeping the developed countries from creating this facility?