“China’s contributions to global climate finance are on the same order – if not higher than – many developed countries.”
In November 2024, China made a landmark move at the UN climate talks in Baku, Azerbaijan when vice premier Ding Xuexiang portrayed China’s international finance as a form of climate finance. His statement, and China’s subsequent actions, represented an evolution of China’s long-held stance in UN climate negotiations.
Six months on, with Trump again pulling the US from the Paris Agreement and taking a hatchet to various climate-related funding mechanisms – as well as launching an all-out trade war – China’s positioning of itself as a non-traditional climate finance contributor is even more significant for the future of global climate action.
At the World Leaders Climate Action Summit as COP29 opened, Ding made a pivotal statement: “Since 2016, China has provided and mobilised more than CNY 177 billion [USD 24.5 billion] of project funds in support of other developing countries’ climate response.”
This declaration was the first time a Chinese official referred to climate finance for developing countries in the context of provision and mobilisation – the language applied to developed countries – rather than as “South-South cooperation”. The figure includes a wide range of investments by China’s development banks and other actors, rather than just those earmarked for South-South climate aid, which had previously been benchmarked by officials at CNY 1.2 billion (USD 170 million).
Ding’s remarks placed China’s contributions to global climate finance on the same order – if not higher than – many developed countries’ efforts. They also demonstrated that China may have the capacity and political will to be more transparent about the scale and scope of its own efforts, and to build on what it is already doing, while China’s overwhelming dominance in key clean technology sectors buttressed the case for it.
Source: Dialogo Chino [extract], May 14, 2025. https://dialogue.earth/…/will-china-lead-on-global…/
China Environment News 