All promising, but now action

After three decades, is the multilateral climate regime suffering from a fundamental design flaw? Is its architecture more for promises than action? As COP30 unfolds in Brazil, the task is to initiate a cure for chronic pathologies. Diagnosis points to two core symptoms.

Promise-action gap The system's metrics are geared towards securing new pledges while ignoring implementation failure. October 2025 Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW) report, 'Ten Years of Paris Agreement,' reveals that only 5% of global cooperative climate initiatives have actually accomplished stated goals.

Enforcement vacuum Compare the climate regime to any other major international system. WTO has a dispute settlement mechanism. IMF has conditionalities. WHO has stringent surveillance. UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has a lot less. There is no cost for inaction. This erodes trust and allows backsliding the moment domestic politics becomes inconvenient, or geopolitics become turbulent.

So, what's the treatment? Shift from a culture of negotiation to a culture of implementation.

Pivot towards sectoral and plurilateral routes The hardest-to-abate sectors-green steel, cement, hydrogen-are not solved by 190 countries in a plenary hall. They are solved through deals between 10-15 major companies that dominate global supply chains and their large-scale offtakers.

A car manufacturer needs green steel; a steel producer needs green hydrogen. These are commercial relationships that can be catalysed by state-level interoperable standards and guarantees. UNFCCC's role must be that of a chief medical officer: not running labs, but collating reports from specialist doctors on the front lines and getting them the resources needed.

Repurpose existing tools Trade agreements should be leveraged to guarantee supply security for clean energy components and critical minerals, moving beyond mere market access. Investment treaties offer a powerful, yet untapped, lever.

Imagine a quid pro quo. A host country provides policy certainty and rule of law. In return, investors guarantee a rising percentage of capital flows into the host's green sectors. Failure to invest could trigger a review of those very protections. This is the kind of creative, reciprocal deal-making absent from today's climate conversation.

COP30's Brazilian presidency's proposed 'Action Agenda' is the right idea, as is building a granary of solutions to help create new coalitions. But building the playground is not enough. It must now ask critical players like South Africa, India, the EU and Japan: what would it take for you to reinvest in this system?

Pvt sector, move from vague pledges to credible action It should deploy commercially viable tech now, supporting clear government mandates and forming large-scale off-take agreements to de-risk the massive capital expenditure for green hydrogen and steel.

Not just Christmas wishes Philanthropy should make strategic, focused bets on two fronts: accelerating commercial viability of key technologies and helping developing countries design policies that integrate decarbonisation with development. The goal is to make climate action feel like a core development strategy, securely yoked to the economy, not a burdensome switch.

COP30 must be the summit that stops trying to graduate failing students and starts teaching them how to pass.

(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this column are that of the writer. The facts and opinions expressed here do not reflect the views of www.economictimes.com)