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Leaders of the G7’s major Western economies will on Sunday support a Western rival to China’s “belt and road” initiative, in a plan to mobilize billions of dollars to help developing countries fight climate change.
Joe Biden has led calls to offer poor countries a new source of infrastructure funding, providing a “democratic” alternative to Chinese lending, which is seen in the West as a tool to spread Beijing’s influence.
He G7 summit in Cornwall, it will agree on what Boris Johnson’s allies, the summit host, call a “green belt and road” plan, with richer countries helping to fund schemes that reduce carbon emissions.
Johnson wants to focus on supporting green initiatives and has been wary of presenting the initiative as an “anti-Chinese” movement. British officials say they want the G7 to “show what we are for, not who we are against.”
But the White House favors a broader infrastructure support package and is explicit about its willingness to provide a new counterweight to China’s influence.
“We have a slightly narrower approach,” a British official said.
On Saturday, G7 leaders held talks to coordinate China’s strategy. “There was a broad agreement that we should cooperate with Beijing on issues such as the fight against climate change, compete in areas such as global supply chains and compete on issues such as human rights,” an official told the talks. .
The “Rebuild Better for the World” plan will give countries better access to funding for low-carbon projects, such as wind farms and railways.
The plan aims to boost climate finance from multilateral development banks as well as the private sector, and was presented as a “Green Marshall Plan” by some officials, but on a smaller scale.
G7 leaders are expected to pledge to increase their contributions to international climate finance to achieve the pre-existing goal of mobilizing $ 100 billion a year from rich countries, to help poor countries support ecological growth.
However, an official who watched the discussions said: “It was a brief detail on how this would be achieved.”
A senior US official said on Friday: “The United States and many of our partners and friends around the world have long been skeptical about China’s initiative and the belt.
“We have seen the Chinese government demonstrate a lack of transparency, poor environmental and labor standards and an approach that has left many countries worse off.
“But so far we have not offered any positive alternative that reflects our values, our standards and our way of doing business.”
Environmental groups criticized the lack of details on how the plan would be funded and run, which led some to warn that they were nothing more than empty promises.
Climate change is one of the top priorities of G7 leaders at the summit, but leaders are struggling to agree on funding. Germany, Canada, Japan and Italy are only expected to announce new climate finance in Cornwall.
G7 leaders will pledge to phase out gasoline and diesel cars and shut down all coal-fired power plants that do not use emission capture technology as soon as possible. They will also pledge to protect 30% of the planet’s land and ocean by 2030.
With the UK hosting the COP26 climate summit in November, this weekend’s summit in Cornwall is expected to provide an overview of how the world’s largest industrialized democracies will face the international climate crisis.
Several weather groups were unimpressed, saying the Build Back Better plan seemed inaccurate and weak.
“We still don’t know the timing or scale of these ads, and without that, these are just empty promises,” said Catherine Pettengell, interim head of Climate Action Network UK.
People familiar with the process said the UK came relatively late in trying to put together its green infrastructure plan. An official who watched Saturday’s G7 deliberations said Johnson on one occasion appeared to be shuffling the names of various schemes.
Johnson said: “The G7 has an unprecedented opportunity to drive a global green industrial revolution, with the potential to transform the way we live.”
All G7 countries are committed to achieving net carbon emissions by 2050, making climate policies a broad area of agreement. But differences over issues such as coal and climate finance donations have, however, led to difficulties in negotiations on the final language of the leaders’ statement.
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