Reaction to the New Report on The Baku to Belém Roadmap to USD 1.3 Trillion Finance

mailforkrishna31
27 minutes ago
4 min read

5 November 2025

"The Baku to Belém Roadmap correctly identifies the symptoms of our broken financial system. However, the roadmap is like offering a band-aid for a mortal wound and fundamentally fails to prescribe the cure."

"Instead of demanding the grant-based public finance that developed countries owe as their 'fair share,' it offers a reheated diet of market-based solutions, MDB reforms, loans and private capital. This is not the transformation we have been demanding but a dangerous evasion of wealthy countries' responsibility.

“The report is silent on holding polluters accountable and glaringly omits the true financial gap for loss and damage. We need a roadmap that dismantles this unjust system and holds its architects accountable."

Harjeet Singh, climate activist and founding director of Satat Sampada Climate Foundation

Baku to Belém Roadmap to 1.3T":

A Climate Justice Analysis by Satat Sampada Climate Foundation

Summary

The "Baku to Belém Roadmap to 1.3T" report provides a comprehensive diagnosis of the systemic challenges in the global climate finance architecture. It successfully identifies critical symptoms of injustice, including crippling debt burdens,

deep-seated inequalities, and barriers to access for

vulnerable communities.

However, the report stops short of adopting a climate justice framework. It does not explicitly demand finance from developed countries based on their "fair share" or historical responsibility, nor does it contain any mechanisms to "hold polluters to account."

The report's primary focus is on mobilzation from all sources and system efficiency, relying heavily on Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) and private finance. While it identifies what is broken, its prescribed solutions remain largely within the existing market-based financial architecture rather than proposing a transformative,

justice-oriented one.

2. Key Alignments with Climate Justice Principles

The finance report effectively identifies several key issues that are central to the climate justice discourse:

Strong Diagnosis of Inequality: The report highlights acute global inequalities, explicitly stating that the top 10% of global individual carbon emitters generate almost half of all greenhouse gas emissions. This provides a clear, data-driven basis for a "fair share" argument.
Highlighting Public Finance Failures: The report provides critical context by noting the projected 9% to 17% drop in Official Development Assistance (ODA) in 2025. It also references the long-standing failure of developed countries to meet their 0.7% of ODA/GNI commitment, which it estimates could generate an additional USD 197 billion.
Inclusion of Just Transition Finance: The inclusion of "Financing just transitions" as a core thematic area is a significant addition. The report gives this concept concrete financial grounding, estimating the need to scale spending from USD 10 billion per year today to USD 50 billion per year by 2035.
Focus on Systemic Financial Injustices: The report is particularly strong in its critique of systemic issues.
Debt: It highlights the crippling nature of debt, noting 3.4 billion people live in countries that spend more on debt interest payments than on health or education.
ISDS: It directly attacks the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) system, which penalizes climate action. It notes that up to USD 83 billion has already been awarded in disputes against policies like denying permits for high-emission projects and recommends a working group to ensure treaties "can no longer penalize the development of climate-related policies".
Prioritizing Vulnerable & Excluded Groups: The report consistently emphasizes the need to support those most affected, calling for redoubled efforts for "Indigenous peoples and local communities, to women, to micro small and medium-sized enterprises" and noting that women face "systemic barriers to accessing finance".

3. Key Gaps and Divergences from a Climate Justice Framework

Despite its strengths in diagnosis, the finance report's recommendations diverge significantly from a climate justice framework:

Dilution of "Fair Share" Obligations: The report frames the 1.3T goal as a collective mobilization from "all actors." By including "South-South cooperation, amounting to USD 40 billion" in its pathways, it dilutes the primary, historical obligation of developed countries under the UNFCCC, effectively shifting the burden to "all."
Absence of the "Polluter Pays" Principle: The report fails to hold polluters to account. There are no mechanisms for liability or reparations. The closest it comes is a timid suggestion that countries could explore levies on "highly-polluting and
GHG-intensive activities". The new Climate Finance Action Fund (CFAF) is framed as a voluntary investment fund, not a binding "polluter pays" mechanism.
Omission of the Loss & Damage Finance Gap: The report provides a clear, quantified finance gap for adaptation (needs of USD 310-365 billion/year vs. flows of USD 26 billion). However, it provides no equivalent quantified gap for Loss and Damage, bundling it with adaptation in a single estimate. This is a major omission that downplays the scale of L&D needs.
Over-Reliance on MDBs and Market Mechanisms: The report’s solutions are heavily weighted toward MDBs and private finance, which are debt- and loan-centric. Action Front 3, "Rechannelling - Transformative Private Finance", champions market-based solutions like catalytic equity, guarantees, carbon markets, and insurance. This approach prioritizes mobilizing private capital (which seeks a return) over securing public grants (which fulfill an obligation).
Explicitly Non-Transformative Approach: The report is not a blueprint for a new financial system. It explicitly states its intent is "not to originate new financing schemes and mechanisms, but to provide a coherent reference framework on existing initiatives". While it lists innovative sources like wealth taxes, it presents them as a menu of options rather than a formal demand for a new, justice-oriented architecture.