COP28 UAE Declaration on Sustainable Agriculture, Resilient Food Systems, and Climate Action: nothing wrong – nothing new!
By Christian Häberli (PhD, Law). MATS Researcher | World Trade Institute, University of Bern
This Declaration is clearly worded as “Intent”: (i) to work collaboratively and expeditiously, and (ii) to strengthen our respective and shared efforts.
I see nothing wrong with the ambitious list of actions – including by non-signatories. And the review dates offer a valuable roadmap to monitor and assess progress collectively (“review our collective progress next year at COP29 with a view to considering next steps in 2025 and beyond” and “before the convening of COP30”).
On the other hand, I see nothing new in this Declaration in terms of concrete policy commitments, references to harmful subsidies, or climate footprint-reduction targets. There are references to previously agreed texts, both UNFCCC and COPs, and in other fora. But compared with, say, the Sharm El Sheikh Joint Work on implementation of climate action in agriculture and food security decided at COP27, there is no visible progress here. Let alone an acknowledgement of the failure of the so far only attempt to define concrete measurements, measures, and policy reforms implementing the Paris Climate Agreement for agriculture (the so-called Koronivia Process cf. https://www.fao.org/koronivia/en/)
Agriculture remains in the domestic realm. International organisations such as FAO, UNFCCC or OECD are playing useful roles, and they have been doing for decades the kind of work in this COP28 UAE Declaration. But they continue being prevented from laying down binding standards such as Good Agricultural Practices. As for the WTO rules pertaining to agriculture, the maximum tariffs agreed, the export subsidy prohibitions and the (trade-distorting) domestic support limitations are certainly welcome features for a more reliable contribution of agrifood trade to global food security. But there still are no rules against environmental and social dumping, let alone to allow climate mitigation measures focusing on differentiation between products with different carbon contents, or on the specific climate needs of developing countries, both in line with the Paris Agreement commitments.
In short: NIL NOVI! Nothing in this Declaration obliges governments or non-state actors to reduce the climate footprint of agricultural production, agrifood processing, and trade.
Who will pick up the bill of global warming, and of farming when temperatures climb to 60 degrees Celsius?