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As the UN General Assembly kicks off again this year, Oxfam’s experts and partners are available to speak to their work focused on the People’s Vaccine for COVID-19, the climate crisis - including climate finance, and a number of pressing humanitarian crises. 

Responding to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Working Group I contribution to the Sixth Assessment Report, Oxfam Climate Policy Lead Nafkote Dabi said: “Amid a world in parts burning, in parts drowning and in parts starving, the IPCC today tables the most compelling wake-up call yet for global industry to switch from oil, gas and coal to renewables."

Using land alone to remove the world’s carbon emissions to achieve ‘net zero’ by 2050 would require at least 1.6 billion hectares of new forests, equivalent to five times the size of India or more than all the farmland on the planet, reveals a new Oxfam report today.

As the Earth Day Summit concluded, Oxfam applauded President Biden for convening world leaders in an effort to increase global climate ambition, lower emissions, and build resilience. However, more action is needed to avert dangerous climate change impacts that are already disproportionally harming those who are most vulnerable.

Over a decade ago, developed countries committed to mobilize $100bn per year by 2020 to support developing countries to adapt and reduce their emissions. The goal is a critical part of the Paris Agreement. As 2020 draws to a close, Oxfam’s Climate Finance Shadow Report 2020 offers an assessment of progress towards this goal.

“The postponement should not delay urgently needed action on climate change which is already increasing poverty and suffering around the world", said Danny Sriskandarajah, Oxfam GB Chief Executive, in response to the announcement that the UN Climate Summit is being pushed back to November 2021 ―a year after it was originally scheduled. 

(Bonn, Germany) A lack of urgency imperils the likelihood of an ambitious 2015 climate agreement, Oxfam warned today as talks continued at the latest UNFCCC meeting in Bonn, Germany.

Explaining Oxfam’s decision to join civil society movements and trade unions in walking out of the UN climate change talks today, Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of Oxfam International said:

World leaders could make significant progress toward a climate fund for developing countries when the United Nations Climate Change Conference (UNCCC) resumes talks in Tianjin , China.

As the latest round of UNFCCC talks on climate change draw to a close today, Oxfam warns that there has been a clear lowering of expectations ahead of the next UN climate summit in Cancun which will stall the progress needed unless negotiations step up several gears.