Good morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%],

What was won in Paris (2015) and Glasgow (2021) has been watered down in Egypt. 

The 27th edition of the Conference of Parties (COP27)—the United Nations’ annual conference on climate change—dragged to a close on Sunday after being extended by day. But there’s only one small victory to write home about.

Everyone has finally agreed to create a new fund to compensate the most vulnerable developing countries that are bearing the brunt of climate change. It’s called a loss-and-damage (L&D) fund. 

 Since rich countries are already far behind on keeping their earlier promise of coughing up US$100 billion annually for global climate change mitigation, I’d be (delightfully) surprised if the new L&D fund gets off to a roaring start. A statement from the COP27 presidency says that monetary compensation expected from the L&D fund is already pegged at US$500 billion, and rising by US$200 billion annually. 

I mean, just the United States’ emissions alone have had a huge negative impact on GDP per capita in most parts of the developing world.