Let COP30 be the year Africa acts boldly on tackling climate change

For thirty years, the world has come together under the UN’s blue banners to combat climate change. We have produced countless reports, inspiring speeches and endless statements.

Yet, the atmosphere records only one thing: the truth of our actions. The truth is hard to face - emissions are still rising, climate finance remains mostly theoretical, and vulnerable communities continue to bear the highest burden of a crisis they did not cause.

Something or someone is deeply wrong. If we cut through the diplomatic language and speak plainly, as Africans must, COP30 in Belém, Brazil, is happening because the world has failed to act at the scale needed. Since COP1 in Berlin, the “inadequacy of commitments” has been acknowledged every decade. Kyoto set legally binding targets for developed nations, yet many were quietly missed.

Copenhagen promised $100 billion a year for developing countries, a figure that became more of a political slogan than reality. Paris made a noble pledge to keep warming below 2°C. Sharm el-Sheikh delivered a historic Loss and Damage agreement. But without funding, even the noblest agreements become empty gestures.

Today, as Brazil hosts COP30 at the edge of the Amazon, the contradictions are striking. The world praises forests while expanding fossil fuel exploration. It pledges climate justice while extending loans instead of grants. It talks about 1.5°C but approves new oil and gas fields whose lifespans extend well beyond that goal. So, who is at fault?

First, wealthy nations have regarded climate finance as charity rather than a duty. The unfulfilled $100 billion promise has damaged trust. Even the new COP29 finance goal, at least $300 billion annually, still falls far short of the $1.3 trillion experts say is necessary for developing countries to adapt, mitigate and transition. Counting loans as climate finance is not justice; it’s accounting tricks.

Second, the fossil fuel system continues to influence the global agenda. Even as we discuss transitions, powerful interests keep pushing for new extraction in fragile landscapes, from the Amazon Delta to Africa’s deep waters. No honest conversation about climate progress can happen as long as fossil fuel expansion remains politically acceptable.

Third, Africa must recognise our internal weaknesses. Some climate funds, when they arrive, are lost to bureaucracy, misallocation, or corruption. We cannot demand fairness abroad while tolerating failure at home. Our credibility depends on discipline. Yet Africa is not a victim of climate politics; we are the missing protagonist. We possess most of the world’s uncultivated arable land, vast renewable energy resources, essential critical minerals, and some of the planet’s largest carbon sinks, from the Congo Basin to Miombo woodlands.

Our youth are more innovative than our policies. Our ecosystems stabilise the world’s climate far more than global markets recognise. If Africa decided to negotiate as a unified bloc, firmly, clearly and without apology, the global climate conversation would shift instantly.

But to move COP30 from theater to truth, the world must accept a simple reality: climate success can now be measured by whether emissions decrease, whether finance actually reaches vulnerable communities as grants, and whether households become safer, ranging from farmers with irrigation to herders with fodder reserves and coastal families protected from storms. Everything else is noise. For Africa, COP30 must deliver four essentials. First, climate finance at the scale needed by science, not politics. Second, a fair energy transition that enables us to develop industry cleanly while using limited gas responsibly as a bridge. Third, fully fund the Loss and Damage Fund with new, predictable money.

Fourth, there is a growing global acknowledgment that protecting African and Amazonian forests is not charity; it is a sensible investment in the planet’s survival.

After 30 years of COPs, the mistakes are known. The problems are clear. What has been missing is respect for science, for African lives, for indigenous wisdom, and for future generations. History will not remember COP30 for what leaders promised but for what changed after they went home. Think Green. Act Green!

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