G20 Leaders' Summit: Climate Action Goals Announced.

G20 Leaders came together in New Delhi on September 9-10, 2023, at the G20 Summit hosted by the Indian G20 presidency. In the Leaders’ Declaration published at the end of the Summit, themed “One Earth, One Family, One Future,” the leaders announced dynamic and ambitious goals in the field of climate action. Accordingly, the leaders committed to the following:

1. Taking concrete action to address global challenges and pursuing development models that implement sustainable, inclusive, and just transitions globally,
2. Accelerating strong, sustainable, balanced, and inclusive growth,
3. Accelerating the full and effective implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development,
4. Pursuing low-GHG/low-carbon emissions, climate-resilient, and environmentally sustainable development pathways by championing an integrated and inclusive approach,
5. Improving access to medical countermeasures and facilitating more supplies and production capacities in developing countries to prepare better for future health emergencies,
6. Promoting resilient growth by urgently and effectively addressing debt vulnerabilities in developing countries,
7. Scaling up financing from all sources for accelerating progress on SDGs,
8. Accelerating efforts and enhancing resources towards achieving the Paris Agreement, including its temperature goal,
9. Pursuing reforms for better, bigger, and more effective Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) to address global challenges to maximize developmental impact,
10. Improving access to digital services and digital public infrastructure, and leveraging digital transformation opportunities to boost sustainable and inclusive growth,
11. Promoting sustainable, quality, healthy, safe, and gainful employment,
12. Closing gender gaps and promoting the full, equal, effective, and meaningful participation of women in the economy as decision-makers, and
13. Ensuring better integration of the perspectives of developing countries into future G20 agendas.

G20 Leaders also made comprehensive assessments of the multilateral trading system. Accordingly, the leaders highlighted the need for and announced their intention to collaborate on:

1. Supporting policies that enable trade and investment to serve as an engine of growth and prosperity for all,
2. Having a rules-based, non-discriminatory, fair, open, inclusive, equitable, sustainable, and transparent multilateral trading system, 
3. Ensuring a level playing field and fair competition by discouraging protectionism and market-distorting practices, to foster a favorable trade and investment environment for all,
4. Increasing Micro-, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises‘ (MSMEs) access to information to promote the integration of developing countries’ SMEs into international trade,
5. Monitoring developments in global value chain (GVC) mapping in order to help countries identify risks and build resilience, 
6. Ensuring that trade and environmental policies support each other, consistent with the relevant Agreement provisions. 

G20 Leaders also made interesting remarks in the field of energy and agreed to work on: 

1. Enabling strong, sustainable, balanced, and inclusive growth and accelerating clean, sustainable, just, affordable, and inclusive energy transitions in order to achieve climate goals,
2. Continuing efforts to provide low-cost financing to support developing countries' transition to low carbon emissions and triple renewable energy capacity globally,
3. Determining the investments required for the transition to clean energy. 

The leaders noted that developing countries need $5.8–5.9 trillion in financing in order to implement their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) by 2030. However, while G20 leaders committed to increasing clean energy, they failed to reach a consensus on cutting down fossil fuels.

In summary: 
G20 Leaders made various observations and commitments to create a more inclusive and sustainable world in the summit outcome document. The leaders included these observations and commitments under the headings of:

• Advancing financial inclusion,
• Fighting corruption,
• Accelerating progress on the SDGs,
• Strengthening global health and implementing the “One Health” approach, 
• Ensuring finance–health collaboration,
• Delivering quality education,
• Establishing a green development pact for a sustainable future,
• Designing a circular economy world,
• Implementing clean, sustainable, just, affordable, and inclusive energy transitions, 
• Delivering on climate and sustainable finance,
• Conserving, protecting, sustainably using and restoring ecosystems,
• Ending plastic pollution,
• Reducing disaster risks and creating resilient infrastructures,
• Reinvigorating multilateralism and reforming international financial institutions,
• Managing global debt vulnerabilities, 
• Supporting technological transformation and digital public infrastructure,
• Fostering digital ecosystems, and
• Improving the international financial system and solving the problems of the finance industry. 

The decisions made at the G20 Leaders’ Summit serve as key indicators of the drafts and national commitments that may be brought to the agenda at the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 28) to be held in the United Arab Emirates from November 30 to December 12.