BRICS Carbon Agreement Expected From COP29 Commitments  

The BRICS countries have drafted a special memorandum for partnership on carbon markets and it is expected to be signed before the end of 2024, according to Nikita Kondratyev, the director of multilateral economic cooperation and special projects at Russia’s Economic Development Ministry.

He was speaking during a session at the UN COP29 climate conference, which has been taking place in Baku, Azerbaijan. The BRICS includes Russia as well as Brazil, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the UAE, and as such are a major part of any global climate change initiatives and carbon emitting directives. The COP meetings are organised by the United Nations to help combat climate change and bring global warming and its associated effects under control.   

The launch of a BRICS partnership is expected to enable the BRICS nations to study one another’s experience in creating carbon markets and implement joint climate projects, including with the issue of carbon units.

Kondratyev said that “Everyone is looking, foremost, to the negotiation processes within the context of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, and when we try to propose to build our own system, everyone is a little scared of this. The main goal is to understand one another better and the national mechanisms that are being used in each BRICS country.”

He recalled that the BRICS countries created a contact group for climate cooperation and sustainable development this year and also identified the range of key issues: a just energy transition, its financing, adaptation, mitigation and carbon regulation.

“We hope that the Brazilian chairmanship next year will coordinate this work between COP and BRICS and pick up all our initiatives that we adopted and are applying. We’ve precisely set the goal of signing the memorandum on carbon markets before the end of the year,” Kondratyev said.

Russia signed memoranda of understanding on climate change and low carbon development with India and Azerbaijan this year, the Economic Development Ministry said. There are plans to sign similar memoranda with another ten countries in 2025, including Brazil, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Egypt, Oman, China and Singapore.

Further Reading

Russia At COP29 – Moving Carbon Regulation To Asian Standards