ACCESS4ALL Group

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) used its massive oil reserves and the Congo Basin rainforest to enhance its bargaining power in the global climate talks in the run up to COP27. The DRC attracted the interest of the world by declaring the oil and gas auction in 2022, which included blocks in the ecologically sensitive regions, essentially compelling the rich countries to transition to specific actions instead of promises to actual climate finance. Meanwhile, the DRC also placed a strong focus on the world significance of its rainforests as the important carbon sinks, and the protection of the rainforests was presented as the international obligation. Its bargaining power was also enhanced with multilateral coordination with the REDD +, the Coalition of rainforest nations and coalitions with the forest rich countries like Brazil and Indonesia which enabled the forest rich countries to make a single demand of predictable and sufficient compensation. DRC also placed its claims in the loss and damage framework pointing out that although its contribution to global emissions is minimal, it is affected by the global climate disasters in the worst and in many cases irreversible ways. Although ethically challenging, this use of the threat of environmental degradation checks the deep-seated climate justice inequity, and the need of high emitting nations to offer just and timely climate funding to ensure that conservation is not at the cost of development.