Dive Brief:
- CEOs and senior executives from over 100 global corporations are calling on governments and the private sector to accelerate climate action to meet the goals set in the Paris Agreement, according to an open letter released by the World Economic Forum’s alliance of CEOs.
- The letter, released almost a month ahead of the COP29 climate summit in November, is backed by 112 leaders in total, representing companies across a broad range of sectors, including Ball, Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Co., Deloitte, Henkel, Ikea, H&M, Nestlé, PepsiCo, Unilever and others.
- Signatories said governments and businesses need to collaborate to address challenges related to climate risk mitigation, including deciphering complex policies and the adoption of reporting frameworks. Such collaboration would “accelerate action at scale” and move it “from pledges to impact,” according to the executives.
Dive Insight:
Members of the Alliance of CEO Climate Leaders — collectively representing $4 trillion in revenue — that signed the letter said governments and the private sector need to work closely together to overcome a gap of approximately 600 gigatons in emissions reduction needed to limit global temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
The Oct. 10 statement also lays out a number of asks for regulators and policy makers that will “improve the business case for climate action and spur investment.”
Among them, corporate leaders asked governments to update their enhanced emissions reduction plans or Nationally Determined Contributions to provide more transparency to businesses, invite stakeholder input and establish sector-specific energy transition pathways.
Additionally, the group urged governments to scale climate finance to support the voluntary carbon markets, phase out fossil fuel subsidies and attract long-term private green investments by lowering associated risks. The group also called for increased supply of renewable and clean energy and improved energy efficiency to remove “transition obstacles” that can hinder governments from meeting COP28 pledges, and backed climate technologies such as carbon removals and clean hydrogen that are needed to meet industrial decarbonization goals.
The letter stressed that “governments cannot act alone.” The executives urged fellow business leaders to ramp up decarbonization strategies across their operations and supply chain by setting science-based targets, disclosing emissions reduction progress and creating climate transition plans that are aligned with global frameworks and standards.
“Business leaders should strengthen cross-sector value chain collaboration by supporting their suppliers, including small- and medium-sized enterprises, to decarbonize through technical assistance, capability building, knowledge sharing and financial mechanisms such as incentives and investments in advanced climate technologies,” the letter states.
The letter comes a month after a coalition of 534 financial institutions that collectively manage $29 trillion in assets urged global governments to “take robust action” to address the climate crisis at the annual UN climate summit. The statement, backed by founding members of The Investor Agenda — a climate leadership initiative from Ceres, the United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative, the Carbon Disclosure Project and others — asked governments to enact policies that unlocked the private capital needed to support a green transition.
The COP29 summit is set to take place in Baku, Azerbaijan, starting Nov. 11.
