A defining image of
our contemporary era might be a middle-class family at an airport in Asia or
Africa, their smartphones tucked into their bags, boarding a flight to Dubai or
Singapore or London. Such an image will not capture headlines or go viral, but its
commonplace nature reflects a dramatic transformation in our world over the
last five decades.
اضافة اعلان
Historians may
eventually define this period as the “Development Age”, when vast swathes of
humanity, once mired in crushing poverty and limited opportunity, gradually
began to break free from this vicious cycle. Two centuries ago, most of the
world was impoverished. As late as 1955, more than half
the world still lived below the poverty line.
The world looks much
different now. Today, about 10 percent of humanity lives in extreme
poverty (roughly 700 million people). In 2007, for
the first time in history, there were more urban residents than rural
residents. Since then, urbanization rates have risen steadily, widening the
gap. And in 2018, we hit another milestone, according to Homi Kharas of the
Brookings Institution: More than half the world could be considered middle class.
This is our world
today, marked by rapid urbanization, sizable and still growing middle classes,
and unprecedented physical and digital connectivity. It is a world that has
lifted literally more than a billion people from extreme
poverty, but still leaves far too many behind. It is a
world of growing aspirations even amid extraordinary challenges. It has been a
world of rising income per capita — and rising inequalities everywhere.
In 2018, we hit another milestone, according to Homi Kharas of the Brookings Institution: More than half the world could be considered middle class.
This is the world
that should be understood by policymakers in the run-up to the
COP28 climate conference to take place in the United Arab Emirates later this year. We need
to understand recent history to appreciate the present — and to craft a
sustainable future.
A case study in forward-thinking
In a sense, COP28’s
location reflects the changes of our world over the past five decades. The
“before-and-after” pictures of the UAE — shared on the internet or hung on the
walls of government offices — often show dusty streets with modest development
in the 1970s, quickly replaced by Manhattan-style skylines and bustling
airports.
Today, the UAE is
widely acknowledged as a global trade, tourism, and transport hub; a major
global investor; a regional leader in future-facing industries; and an important
bridge between the emerging world and advanced economies. Few saw the rise of
the UAE in these terms when it was a young nation that declared independence in
1971.
While the before-and-after pictures
of the UAE are stark, few other nations think so actively about what the future
should look like. As UAE Minister of Cabinet Affairs Mohammad Al Gergawi
recently noted, “Governments
and policymakers must think of themselves as designers of the future.” In other
words, they must take the long view, planning not for the next five years but for
the next 50.
The UAE as a global
mediator
Policymakers must
also be willing to face the truth with honesty. That truth, as
UAE Climate Envoy and COP28 president Sultan Al-Jaber said recently, is that the world is “way off track” in achieving
reductions in global temperatures laid out by the 2015 Paris Agreement. “The
hard reality is that in order to achieve this goal, global emissions must fall
43 percent by 2030,” he said.
“Governments and policymakers must think of themselves as designers of the future.”
Jaber, who is also
CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company and Minister of Industry and Advanced
Technology, is well-positioned to lead COP28. His early energy experience was
forged not in fossil fuels, but as the CEO of Masdar, the global clean energy
player with a $20 billion-plus portfolio of renewable projects in more than 40
countries. The UAE has been one of the most active clean energy investors
worldwide.
Given the political
and investment attention being paid to the energy transition, it is conceivable
that we are headed for scalable breakthroughs in renewable energy. But the
world will still need fossil fuels for quite some time, both for sustained
development and poverty eradication. With nearly 800 million people still lacking electricity, fossil fuels
will be the cheapest and fastest way to bring them that life-altering force.
The trajectory is clear: We are moving toward broader clean energy use in our systems.
The UAE can serve as
an important mediator between industrialized and developing countries. Let us
be frank: We are in the climate mess now mainly because of industrialization in
Europe and the US, the world’s largest historic emitters. Wealthy nations from
the Global North lecturing the Global South on climate change and emissions is
rich with irony. As an emerging nation itself, the UAE can help bridge this
gap.
Bridge to the
future
There is a plethora
of multibillion-dollar renewable projects online and in the pipeline in the UAE
and Saudi Arabia, two of the world’s largest oil producers. Global fossil fuel majors
are also investing heavily in renewables. Governments in Europe, like the US,
are incentivizing clean energy. Electric vehicle uptake grows every
year. The trajectory is clear: We are moving toward broader clean energy use in
our systems.
When you want to
cross a river with no bridge, the adage goes, build one yourself. That
will be the task for climate negotiators in Dubai later this year. To ensure
that the Development Age is a period of triumph, not tragedy, the world needs a
bridge to transition between the fuels of the past and the clean energy of
tomorrow. COP28 may be the last opportunity to produce one.
Afshin Molavi is a
senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Institute of the Johns Hopkins School of
Advanced International Studies and editor and founder of the Emerging World newsletter. Copyright:
Syndication Bureau.
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