Climate Action

How governments, businesses and civil society are paving the road to COP30 in Latin America

COP30 aims to agree on rules to ensure transparency and credibility in the global carbon market, enabling developing countries to mobilise climate finance from public and private sources.

COP30 aims to agree on rules to ensure transparency and credibility in the global carbon market, enabling developing countries to mobilise climate finance from public and private sources. Image: World Economic Forum / Ciaran McCrickard

Pablo Uchoa
Writer, Forum Stories
This article is part of: World Economic Forum Annual Meeting
  • The World Economic Forum's Annual Meeting in Davos is the first large international gathering since the UN Climate Conference (COP29) held last year in Baku, Azerbaijan, and the next COP30 in Brazil is part of the debate in Davos.
  • Among other objectives, COP30 aims to agree on rules to ensure transparency and credibility in the global carbon market, enabling developing countries to mobilise climate finance from public and private sources.
  • Representatives of Latin America's public and private sector shared in Davos their experiences and outlooks ahead of COP30 in November.

The World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2025 is the first large international gathering since the UN Climate Conference (COP29) held last year in Baku, Azerbaijan, and the next COP30 in Brazil is on the agenda in Davos.

Home to some of the world's most important natural ecosystems – from the highlands of the Andes to the lowlands of the Amazon, the location of COP30's host city, Belém – Latin America is one of the regions most vulnerable to climate change. The next climate summit in Brazil, a year after Colombia hosted a COP on biodiversity, is an indication of the region's commitment to climate action.

Latin America has also had to endure the effects of extreme weather, including flash floods, droughts, heatwaves and cold spells. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) described 2023 as "a year of record climatic hazards in Latin America and the Caribbean". Not surprisingly, Latin Americans recognise the direct effects of climate change on their daily lives and are generally open towards regulation aimed at fostering climate-friendly behaviour.

But the road to COP30 is far from smooth, as President Donald Trump's executive order pulling the United States out of the Paris Agreement on his first day in office shows. Elsewhere, signs of cooperation are strong, and increasingly so too in Latin America, with important contributions from stakeholders from governments, the private sector and civil society.

Here are some of the experiences and lessons shared by some representatives of Latin American countries during Davos 2025:

Pulling all levers

Last year's COP29 was dubbed the "Finance COP" and ended with developed countries agreeing to mobilise $300 billion of climate finance to support developing countries – a figure that fell short of the trillion-dollar figure demanded by developing countries. On the other hand, COP29 marked a key milestone thanks to progress on Article 6 negotiations, which will be key for operationalising carbon markets and creating an alternative for developing countries to mobilise climate finance, especially from private sources. One of the main goals of COP30 is to build on this progress and reach agreement on clearer rules to improve transparency and credibility in carbon trading, underpinning a global carbon system that encourages greater participation from the public and private sector.

But this journey is promising to be "arduous and long", given the heterogeneity of the world's current carbon markets – which have been described as "a bit of a Wild West" and "messed up" by participants of a session in Davos. Maisa Rojas Corradi, Minister of Environment of Chile, said Chile has had its own carbon market implemented domestically to international standards for a decade now, in the expectation of Article 6 becoming fully operational. The country's environmental legislation has set a target for achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 by addressing both the causes and the consequences of climate change. As an example, Corradi mentioned the problem of air pollution, which is intertwined with CO2 emissions and can be addressed by curbing the local use of pollutants – creating the triple effect of curbing emissions and air pollution, and improving public health.

"Our approach to climate change in general has been: let’s use all approaches available to us. The transformation that we need in the world is so big that we should use all the tools that are available to us," reiterated Corradi. That means leveraging carbon markets but also incentives and other resources in the government's toolkit to advance the energy transition more broadly. Chile's experience, which includes transitioning from 40% coal use only a few years ago to targeting 70% renewable energy by 2030, is a testament to its ambition in this space.

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The role of the private sector

But while large diplomatic events like the UN Climate Conferences tend to highlight the role of governments, the private sector has also emerged as a critical actor in advancing sustainability goals, particularly where this intersects with innovation. Companies like iFood, one of Latin America’s largest technology platforms, are demonstrating how integrating technology, sustainability, and socioeconomic impact can lead to change.

iFood has been carbon neutral since 2021 but has pivoted more recently from a strategy of carbon credit purchase to direct emission reduction, experimenting with innovations from drone-operated deliveries to carbon neutral mopeds. Speaking during a Brazil-themed session in Davos, Luana Ozemela, iFood's Chief Sustainability Officer, explained that fuel represents about 70% of the costs of delivery drivers. Carbon-neutral mopeds thus not only curb emissions but have a direct impact on people's earnings. "It is a double dividend," said Ozemela. As a result, iFood prevented 25,000 tons of carbon from being released into the atmosphere. The potential benefits of expanding this technology to 32 million motorcycles circulating in Brazil – the largest fleet in the hemisphere – are clear.

With a platform of around 400,000 delivery workers, iFood also offers financial services for small entrepreneurs and leverages 150 different models of proprietary AI to create social impact, from expanding access to adult education to fostering road safety and curbing fraud. "Technology allows us to connect these micro-entrepreneurs to the digital revolution. Micro-enterprises in Brazil still work in the same way as they did 30 years ago, so our role is also to bring this digital revolution to these small businesses. Our prosperity depends on the prosperity of small businesses."

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Community-led initiatives

Participants in various sessions at Davos emphasised that communities and broader society have a key role to play in pushing for the achievement of climate goals – from raising environmental awareness through education to pressuring governments and providing market incentives for companies to switch to climate-friendly behaviours.

Alicia Bárcena Ibarra, Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources of Mexico, highlighted positive experiences from her country, which experienced devastating losses to human life, ecosystems and communities after its Pacific coast, near Acapulco, was hit by hurricanes Otis and John in 2023 and 2024, respectively. The absence of natural barriers like mangroves and forests left the coastline defenceless, leading to widespread destruction.

As Mexico’s 11,000 kilometers of coastline remain at risk, community-led collaborative efforts like the restoration of the historic area of Xochimilco, just south of Mexico City, highlight the critical role of communities in shaping sustainable outcomes.

Xochimilco, meaning "field of flowers" in the Nahuatl language, was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1988 for preserving the remnants of the pre-Hispanic cultural landscape of the Chinampas, which still endure today. But due to reckless groundwater extraction, the area was once under severe ecological threat. Xochimilco has been revitalized through a collaborative effort involving local communities, Conservation International, and the local government. By building wetlands and restoring water systems, the area has returned to what it was nearly 400 years ago.

Speaking in an open forum in Davos, Barcena said positive community-led experiences fill her with "optimism" as the world's political fragmentation hinders further progress on climate change. She stressed the importance of cross-generation cooperation to fight for environmental justice, saying: "We need more of that in all generations. We need to fight more loudly. We have to get out of our comfort zone and fight loudly about environmental justice."

We have a debt to the young people, at least my generation has. And so the the thing that gives me a lot of hope is when I hear young people come on with proposals, with things that they they want to change and they want to do.

Alicia Bárcena Ibarra, Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources of Mexico

Valuing the standing forest

For hosts Brazil, COP30 is an opportunity to hold climate discussions surrounded by the world's largest rainforest, the Amazon, and "leave a legacy for the forest," said Helder Barbalho, governor of host Para state, during a session in Davos titled "Road to COP30". It will provide an opportunity to engage a multiplicity of stakeholders "to foster a constructive debate involving scientists, public institutions, private sector, and at the same time, to listen to the First Nations and traditional peoples who have always lived in the Amazon."

Following in the footsteps of Baku, COP30 aims to become the "Implementation COP", added Barbalho. "COP30 will be about putting things into practice. So that everything we've been discussing, everything we've been building so far, can become reality at the scale that is needed. So we are not just talking about some specific success cases but having things being implemented at scale."

"A forest with its trees must be worth more than a dead one. And we believe that the carbon market will be an incentive to strengthening our biodiversity, create green jobs, payment for environmental services and ensuring that carbon capture may bring about the compensation strategies to attain the goals established in the Paris Agreement."

Today there is not one single country that is not suffering from climate events with loss of lives and economic losses.

Helder Barbalho, governor of Para state

Ultimately, the challenges go well beyond carbon markets or even mitigating climate impacts but creating an equitable, inclusive and resilient sustainable future. As the Latin American experience demonstrates, governments, the private sector, local communities, and all stakeholders can work together to ensure that what is achieved at the next COP30 aligns with that view.

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