Green Economy Coalition urges G20 to match rhetoric with action

A new coalition of international business, trade unions, research and environmental organisations is calling on the G20 nations to follow through on their pledges to accelerate the transition to a green economy and secure a visionary global deal on climate change, in an open letter published today.

The Green Economy Coalition is hosted by the International Institute for Environment and Development. Its letter warns that G20 nations are failing to match their rhetoric with action, are delaying the transition to sustainable development and are promoting climate change through their subsidies for fossil fuel production and consumption.

It calls on G20 nations to honour aid commitments and provide new funds to enable developing nations to shift to sustainable development pathways.

The Green Economy Coalition will be focusing on the policy changes needed to transform the global economy into one that is clean, green and equitable. It will grow to include about 20 core members in addition to associate members that join specific activities.

In this case, the letter has been signed by heads of Consumers International, the Inspire Foundation for Business and Society, International Trade Union Confederation, WWF International, International Union for the Conservation of Nature, Global Reporting Initiative, Ecologic Institute, Trade Union Advisory Committee to the OECD, Bellagio Forum for Sustainable Development, IISD-Europe, the Centre for Human Ecology and the UN Environment Programme’s Green Economy Initiative.

"The Green Economy Coalition promotes equitable and resilient economies which provide a better quality of life for all, within the ecological limits of one planet," says Sally Jeanrenaud of IIED. "We have a unique opportunity today refocus the world economy by investing in green sectors for a fairer and more sustainable future."

Letter to the 3rd G20 Summit, Pittsburgh, 24-25 September 2009

The Green Economy Coalition1 acknowledges commitments made in the last G20 “Leaders’ Statement”, the G8 Declaration “Responsible Leadership for a Sustainable Future” and the OECD “Declaration on Green Growth”, which recognize the opportunities for tackling global financial, environmental and social crises together in transparent and accountable ways.

In our letter to the G20 in April 2009 we urged governments to invest $750 billion of the $2.5 trillion stimulus package (about 1% of global GDP) towards building a green economy – one that reduces carbon dependency, addresses poverty, generates good quality and decent jobs, maintains and restores our natural ecosystems, and moves towards sustainable consumption.

We note that some progress has been made in stimulating a low carbon economy through investments in a range of initiatives such as improved rail transportation, water infrastructure, grid expansion and improved building efficiency. However, there remain large gaps between government declarations and practice.

Most G20 members have failed to include sufficient green investments in their overall stimulus packages, and the effectiveness of the green stimulus is being compromised by delays in the allocation of funds. At the end of the first half of 2009, only around 3% of committed green funds had been disbursed.

Overall, the amount allocated to renewable energy falls short of the investment needed to reduce carbon emissions and to keep the rise in global average temperature under two degrees Celsius. Some incentives, such as subsidies to the production and consumption of fossil fuels, are working against efforts to build a sustainable future.

Furthermore, while developing countries did not cause the economic and financial crisis, they have been severely affected by it. Development assistance to poor countries has fallen in real terms over the past decade, and millions more vulnerable people will be trapped in poverty this year because of the recession and the effects of climate change, undermining efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.
The global economy is rooted in the natural world. Healthy ecosystems provide essential goods and services to the economy such as freshwater, crop-pollination and the storage of carbon. Investing in the restoration and maintenance of our ecological infrastructure – from forests and mangroves to wetlands and river basins – is a cost effective way to counter climate change and climate-proof vulnerable economies.

The Green Economy Coalition therefore calls upon the G20 to follow through on its commitments to accelerate the transition to the Green Economy, with urgent and decisive action to:

1. invest considerably more in clean energy and energy efficiency so as to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, to create new green jobs and a fair process of transforming traditional jobs into sustainable ones, and to generate secure and sustainable access to energy;
2. honour existing ODA commitments, and mobilize new funds for developing countries through innovative financial mechanisms, and ensure that all financial resources contribute to an inclusive and sustainable recovery in accordance with the priorities of developing countries;
3. support ongoing efforts to quantify and internalize ecosystem values, such as the G8+5 project The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB), and invest in large-scale forest carbon based mitigation measures (such as REDD-Plus) which can help combat climate change, reduce poverty, secure the flow of vital natural services such as freshwater, and conserve biodiversity.
4. encourage transparency, and secure a robust and visionary deal on climate change in Copenhagen later this year by integrating environment and development as well as business and labour issues to lay the foundations for a prosperous, fair and green economy for the 21st Century.

Signed by
Ola Engelmark, Chair, Bellagio Forum for Sustainable Development

John Evans, General Secretary of the Trade Union Advisory Committee to the OECD (TUAC)

Mark Halle, Executive Director, IISD-Europe

R. Andreas Kraemer, Director, Ecologic Institute

James P. Leape, Director General, WWF International

Ernst Ligteringen, Chief Executive of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)

Joost Martens, Director General, Consumers International (CI)

Julia Marton-Lefèvre, Director General, International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)

Professor Alastair McIntosh, Centre for Human Ecology, Scotland

Guy Ryder, General Secretary of The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC)

Pavan Sukhdev, Study Leader: The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB), & Project Leader: Green Economy Initiative, United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)

Camilla Toulmin, Director, International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED)

Jan-Olaf Willums, Chair, Inspire Foundation for Business and Society