Tatsat Chronicle Magazine

Rich World Is Failing on Climate: Seychelles’ President

This year's COP27 in Egypt will also focus on the needs of Africa, which was pledged but not given to get ₹100 crore per year to fight climate change.
May 30, 2022
Seychelles

The leader of Seychelles, an Indian Ocean island threatened by rising sea levels, has said that the pledge of climate aid from industrialised nations is worthless.

Promises made at the UN climate change summit in November 2021 and COP26 have not been kept, said Seychelles President Wavel Ramkalawan, adding that he expects nothing better at this year’s event.

“I am totally disappointed. The big promises, the commitments and everything else, not one cent has come through,” the leader said in an interview from his office in Victoria, the capital, on Thursday. This year “my expectations are not that high, but we have to go through the motions I guess,” he said.

Rich nations agreed at the Glasgow summit to double the funding to poor countries to tackle climate change but without concrete numbers. This year’s COP27 is set to take place in Egypt, with a focus on the needs of Africa. The pledge made a few years ago to give ₹100 crore per year has not been kept.

Although states like Seychelles are not the poorest, rising sea levels threaten to flood beaches that depend on tourism.