Brazil, Mexico, Colombia Unveil New Climate Solutions

Welcome back to Foreign policyLatin America Brief, brought to you from the UN Climate Conference in Belém, Brazil.

This week’s highlights: States are showing off New climate strategies At COP30 in Belem The largest aircraft carrier of the US Navy Enters the area and Presidential candidates in Chile Get creative with their campaign strategies before Sunday’s vote.

UN climate summits are sometimes held in conference centers that display off-putting modernity. And at this year’s edition in Belém, Brazil – known as COP30 – there’s no doubt that we’re on the edge of the Amazon rainforest: rain trickles from the ceiling every afternoon, indigenous leaders who sailed here on boats wander the halls, and menus include fish braised with local fruits and peppers.

Latin America has hosted an annual UN climate conference before, most recently in Peru in 2014, but climate politics in the region have evolved significantly since then.

Although the region suffers from many climate risks – including deforestation and economic models that rely heavily on oil and gas exports – several countries have emerged as global agenda setters. They each bring something a little different to the table.

As I wrote in Foreign policy This week, Brazil is using its COP30 presidency to highlight the need for countries to help create high-quality green jobs through industrial policies. Brazil is also working to persuade countries to form voluntary coalitions for climate action at a time when geopolitical divisions threaten the prospects of a unanimously negotiated agreement at the summit.

At the UN Climate Change Conference (COP30), Colombia strongly calls on oil-producing countries to develop specific roadmaps to move beyond fossil fuels. Colombian officials came to the summit to promote plans to hold a first-of-its-kind international conference on the topic next April. Colombia is also participating in efforts to draft a multi-country declaration on the transition away from fossil fuels during the conference.

Meanwhile, Mexico’s climate plans have continued to evolve under President Claudia Sheinbaum, a climate scientist. The country introduced its first-ever economy-wide emissions cap for 2035 at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP30), which the World Resources Institute described as “among the most ambitious new climate targets from a major emitter.” said Anid Velasco of the Mexican Center for Environmental law Foreign policy Although the target was important progress, climate specialists are still waiting for the full details of the new emissions plan to better understand them.

Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Alicia Bárcena said the Mexican government set climate goals through workshops involving state and federal officials, as well as companies, researchers and indigenous groups. Foreign policy. She said Mexico held a Latin American and Caribbean Ministerial Meeting on Climate Action with 22 countries in August, resulting in a common position that climate action “cannot be separated from social and economic development.”

In addition to these country-led initiatives, Latin America’s contributions to the UN Climate Change Conference (COP30) extend to the turbulent but important world of multilateral development banks.

The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) is launching for the first time a program to make private banks more confident in investing money in climate and other development projects in Latin America. The program, called ReInvest+, combines investments with private insurance and offers an attractive target rate of return to private lenders.

Much of the world’s capital is “extremely risk averse,” said Avinash Persaud, senior climate advisor at the Islamic Development Bank. “We will meet investors where they are. We will give them what they asked for and were not offered.”

Although it is too early to say how much interest these efforts will generate, Persaud has a strong track record of pushing reforms in public banking. Persaud said he was an advisor to Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley on the Bridgetown Initiative, which helped advocate for reforms at the Islamic Development Bank and the World Bank, among others, that expanded overall loan capacity by at least $500 billion in the past three years.

“For all aspects of development” – including climate – “you can’t get there without the multilateral development banks,” he added.

Friday, November 14 to Friday, November 21: COP30 continues in Belem.

Sunday 16 November: Chile holds general elections.

Paz became president. US Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau attended the inauguration of center-right Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz on November 8, and described Paz’s presidency as a “new era” in US-Bolivia relations. Landau said Paz intends to allow US technology company Starlink to operate in the country, which reflects the position of the previous government. He expected more American investments in the region to follow soon.

Starlink (Tesla) founder Elon Musk has long eyed potential investments in Bolivia due to its untapped lithium reserves, which are key to electric car batteries. Until now, there has been tight government control over the sector, and there has been little or no private investment. Paz has not yet announced his plans for Bolivia’s lithium sector.

Chilean President Gabriel Buric and Argentine President Javier Miley, ideologically opposed but regional neighbors, also attended Paz’s inauguration.

Musical elections in Chile Ahead of the first round of voting in Chile’s presidential election on Sunday, the candidates made their closing arguments through song. Centre-right candidate Evelyn Mathie – who is trailing in the polls – has released a music video aimed at attracting urban youth.

Jose Antonio Caste, Mathey’s right-wing opponent, called the video a “big mistake.” But he’s tried similar tactics: His campaign uploaded an entire album to Spotify last month, including genres from reggaeton to K-pop.

Kast and leftist Janet Jara, who has a simpler campaign soundtrack, are leading in the polls ahead of Sunday’s vote. The economy and security are the most important issues for voters.

Fish please. The work of COP30 organizers to include local Amazonian chefs in their menu planning has not been without a diplomatic incident. Organizers of the Earthshot Prize, an initiative backed by Britain’s Prince William, asked celebrity chef Saulo Jennings to prepare plant-based hors d’oeuvres for last week’s awards ceremony that kicked off more than two weeks of COP events.

The request was an attempt at environmental awareness, but Jennings was surprised when he claimed that cooking with fish was part of sustainable living in the Amazon. “It was disrespectful,” he told . New York Times. “It’s like asking Iron Maiden to play jazz.”

Eventually, a detente was arranged as Jennings, the culinary ambassador to the United Nations, did not cook for the event but stayed behind to prepare other menu items for the COP. “We eat what the forests give us, and what the rivers give us,” he said.

Dignitaries from across the European Union and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) pose for a photo at the EU-CELAC Summit in Santa Marta, Colombia, on November 9. Luis Acosta/AFP via Getty Images

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva made a quick trip away from the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30) over the weekend to head to Santa Marta in Colombia, where European Union officials held a summit with the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC).

The meeting was originally intended to focus largely on economic relations between the two blocs. But it has gained new urgency amid the US military buildup in the Caribbean, which expanded this week to include the world’s largest aircraft carrier.

Leaders such as Sheinbaum and Mottley have expressed opposition to repeated US strikes on alleged drug trafficking targets that Washington has not fully identified, while Colombian President Gustavo Petro has said they violate international law.

Although the EU/CLAC Summit Declaration did not explicitly mention the US military buildup, it pointed to the need to respect international law, oppose the use of force outside the scope of the UN Charter, and recognize that CELAC has defined itself as a “zone of peace.”

A group of Latin American countries abstained from voting on parts of the declaration, underscoring the region’s lack of unity on the issue.

However, the French foreign minister on Tuesday reiterated the message at the G7 ministerial summit in Canada, explicitly saying that the US actions violate international law. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that Europe was unable to determine how the United States would defend its security.

Speaking to Foreign Policy’s John Haltiwanger this week, Argentine international relations scholar Juan Gabriel Tokatalian said that US threats in the Caribbean fit perfectly into a broader international trend that includes Russia’s invasion of Ukraine: The rules-based international order is “dying,” he said.