“CLIMATE LAGGARDS”
Southeast Asian countries have largely been slow to update their national climate plans for the next decade, one of the key requirements for parties to the Paris Agreement before COP30.
Singapore was the only nation in the region to submit its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) before the February deadline, which was later extended to September.
Its NDC roadmap to 2035 highlighted targets including around 6GW of low-carbon electricity imports by 2035, pursuing low-emission technologies including carbon capture and storage and nuclear as well as the phaseout of pure internal combustion engine vehicles by 2040.
In late October, Malaysia and Indonesia submitted their NDCs.
Malaysia now projects its emissions to peak sometime between 2029 and 2034, while Indonesia – the region’s largest economy and emitter – is projected to peak by 2030, a goal heavily dependent on forestry and land use.
Indonesia’s NDC gave no details of plans for early retirement of coal-fired power plants or a fossil fuel phase-out strategy, despite bold statements from President Prabowo Subianto at the G20 last year of his plan to phase out the country’s enormous coal fleet within 15 years.
“Indonesia’s climate targets are a bitter disappointment,” Sisilia Nurmala Dewi, the Indonesia team lead of 350.org – a global grassroots organisation advocating for the end of fossil fuel use – said in a statement.
“This glaring disconnect between presidential rhetoric and official policy raises serious questions about the government’s sincerity and commitment to climate action.”
Overall, Southeast Asia has rapid growth yet deep fossil-fuel dependency, even despite its high vulnerability to climate impacts. The region is both vulnerable and pivotal to collective action, analysts said.
Most members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), however, remain “climate laggards”, Overland said, and at present are more likely to “swing” depending on international trends on climate action rather than lead.
“The ASEAN countries are followers and will follow suit if there are strong signals that climate policy is important to the rest of the world,” he said.
“However, with the Trump administration and the unravelling of international cooperation it may become more difficult than ever to bring the ASEAN countries onboard.”
Len said Southeast Asia has the potential to become a genuine policy-mover on the global stage if cooperation is strengthened within the bloc and the region can showcase success stories that other regions aspire to learn from.
Right now, countries in the region have set conditional climate goals which rely on international financial and technological support to be fully achieved.
With an “urgent shortfall” of such funding, he said, climate pledges are not on track across the board.
“Without adequate funding, much remains aspirational in our region. We are in a race against time,” he said.
Source: CNA
