Not fit for purpose: Cop27 made a down-payment on disaster

In the course of 27 climate summits, there has never been a formal agreement to reduce the world’s fossil fuel use

The sunsets behind the Cop27 logo outside the venue of the summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. Picture: AP Photo/Peter Dejong

In the end, Cop27 in Sharm el-Sheikh at least ended up making modest progress on loss and damage — high-emissions nations agreeing to pay those countries bearing the brunt of climate mayhem that they had little to do with bringing about.

But, yet again, there was no commitment to cutting the emissions accelerating this crisis, without which this agreement is nothing more — as one delegate commented — than a “down-payment on disaster”.