🧵Let’s talk about COFFIS and how it is trying to concretise the so far fruitless international commitments to phase out fossil fuel subsidies. 📆COP29 in Baku will feature an event at 12:00 CET, where we will get an update on the initiative:
➡️COFFIS is Coalition on Phasing Out Fossil Fuel Incentives Including Subsidies was born out of the initiative of The Netherlands, and launched with a joint statement of 12 countries at COP28 in 2023. It now includes 13 countries.
The campaign of civil disobedience by @NLRebellion to phase out fossil fuel subsidies in the Netherlands played a key role in the creation of such an initiative.
✍️G20 countries have pledged since 2009 (Pittsburg Declaration) to phase out “inefficient’ fossil fuel subsidies (we’ll come back to “inefficient”):
✍️After that, G7 and G20 countries have kept repeating the same mantra: “we are going to phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies”. In 2016 G7 countries even committed to phase them out by 2025:
❓Did that happen? No. ❌Subsidies have actually increased. To know more about the current status of the pledge see this good summary by the @GRI_LSE :
Why should we care this time? After so many unfulfilled pledges, it seems naĂŻve to expect anything concrete to come out of this. However, we have a clear timeline, which includes the creation of national phase-out plans in the 13 COFFIS member countries.
⏰According to the 2023 Joint Statement, by COP29 (that is, now) COFFIS signatories will publish inventories of direct and indirect fossil fuel subsidies, using existing definitions as a starting point and present an initial methodological framework by COP29.
❗️Nonetheless, the issue of “inefficient” remains, since COFFIS builds upon the commitment to phase out “inefficient” fossil subsidies of G20 countries. And this presents a loophole to countries to leave some fossil subsidies in place.
🤔To this day, there is no common understanding of what an “inefficient” fossil subsidy is. A climate-positive solution would be to define all fossil subsidies as inefficient until proven otherwise. “Efficient” fossil subsidies are a topic for another day.
This is, unfortunately, the pace of international climate action, despite the urgency that world leaders claim to recognise. ✊Only with domestic and international civil society pressure can we hope to accelerate these processes.