U.S. and China Joint COP26 Announcement As a Breakthrough: Why So and What’s Next
By Scott Poynton, Skytop Contributor / November 17th, 2021
Scott Poynton is an Australian forester. He founded The Forest Trust (TFT) in 1999 and grew it into a global non-profit working in 48 countries, impacting more than $1 trillion in supply chain transactions.
Scott supported some of the world’s largest companies to be more environmentally and socially responsible. He brokered major transformations across the wood and agri-commodities sectors, pioneering responsible sourcing and launching the world’s first No Deforestation, No Exploitation commitments.
In 2020, Scott founded The Pond Foundation. Its My Carbon Zero program helps individuals and businesses take their own strong, credible climate action. He also leads A Different Way Limited, supporting C-suite executives and their organizations to grow values-based leadership while sharing the lessons of his experience through writing, presenting and lecturing.
Goodbye To Vitriol and Failed Shaming
We seldom solve anything by yelling at each other. A good bit of anger can help us get the dirty water off our chests, but it can set back efforts to cooperate if the other party gets upset. When relationships are already deeply strained, an out of place critical word can produce turned backs and an unhelpful spat that gets in the way of much needed change.
We don’t need that. We need cooperation.
It’s seldom that we solve any issue alone and unaided, especially one that crosses frontiers and is as complex as climate change.
President Biden Scolds
At the start of the COP26 conference, President Biden scolded both Russia’s President Putin and Chinese President Xi for not joining him, in person, in Glasgow. Their absence, he felt, suggested that they didn’t care. Personally, I don’t care who sits at the table so long as they’re empowered to make meaningful commitments that get implemented later. When I heard President Biden’s speech, my concern was that it could hinder efforts to get the Chinese and the US delegations talking.
Well, clearly not.
A Critical Breakthrough
The US-China announcement around cooperation to take strong climate action in the 2020s is a critical breakthrough. Light on detail it may be, but that can be thrashed out later. Indeed, better not to rush just to please constituents. Good plans that get properly implemented take a lot longer to hatch than greenwashing pledges made for the cameras. I’m glad there isn’t much detail and while NGOs are critical of that, understandably so given the hot air pledges of the past, somehow this feels different because the focus is on the commitment to cooperate rather than on headline grabbing pledges.
Possibilities With Shared Objectives
That the world’s two biggest emitters can pledge to take credible action this decade rather than at some vague time before 2050 is huge. It speaks of the possibilities that can emerge when there are shared objectives, when people can put down their swords and reach across the table. The US and China have so many issues that divide them, but putting those aside to come together and speak about ways to deal with the biggest existential threat humans have ever faced speaks of what’s possible when we act with maturity and vision.
At last!
It is important that the announcement is backed by concrete actions. We look forward to learning more. Fingers crossed. While we wait, let’s just celebrate that these two climate change giants have reached across the divide and said, “Wouldn’t we go further together?”
Even better, let’s use this as inspiration to look at who’s sitting across the table from us, to people where we feel there are divisions, and ponder how, with some maturity and compassion, we might trust our own arm and reach across the divide.
If we don’t cooperate, our respective boats are destined to plunge over the abyss. Presidents Xi and Biden have just shown us a different way is possible.