The Latest | UN Climate Summit

An initiative sponsored by the United States and the United Arab Emirates said it doubled its pledged investment to more than USD 8 billion in climate-smart agriculture and food system innovations.

The initiative, Agriculture Innovation Mission for Climate, said USD 7 billion comes from governments like Australia, South Korea, Singapore, the UAE, the US, and European countries. Private sector-led investment accounted for more than USD 1 billion, it added.

"We've seen a significant increase," said US Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. "It's an opportunity for us to have a virtual platform, where folks can then exchange ideas, keep people informed about the various innovations sprints." He said the initiative now includes more than 275 government and non-government partners and focuses on the reduction of methane and the efficient use of fertilizers. Methane is one of the three main types of heat-trapping greenhouse gases, and is around 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide in the short term.

Vilsack also said they were working in southern Asia to help smallholder farmers by providing them with more data on weather patterns. The Agriculture Department were also working on using genetics, for example in rice cultivation.

"There's an awful lot going on in this space. And we just got started. And over the course of the next couple of years, we'll see more specific results," he said.

KEY DEVELOPMENTS: — Carbon dioxide emissions rising globally, but drop in China — UN to seek out methane emitters with data from space — African nations push for funding to adapt to climate change — In Egypt, host of COP27, a small step toward green energy ___ The success of UN climate talks will be judged by whether commitments are made to set up a financial facility to help poorer countries pay for the effects of climate change, a negotiating group of developing countries said.

Aissatou Diouf, a spokesperson for the Least Developed Countries group, says funding from industrialised nations for countries who have suffered climate-related harms, known as loss and damage, are central to the success of the talks.

"We are urging the industrialised nations not to push the issue of loss and damage under the carpet," Diouf said.

The influential group of some 46 countries is also demanding that industrialized nations to fulfill the Glasgow Pact pledge to double adaptation finance to USD 40 billion until 2025.

Protestors at the UN climate summit in Egypt on Friday condemned the proposed controversial East African Crude Oil Pipeline that runs through Uganda and Tanzania.

Philbert Aganyo, a protester with the group Green Faith Kenya who was at the COP27 protest called the pipeline "1,443 kilometers of pollution, pain and misery." "The reason we are protesting here at COP27 is because the main oil producers are here in this summit. Why are we inviting polluters to conversations of an issue they caused?" Aganyo asked.

The pipeline is owned by Total Energies, China National Offshore Oil Corporation and the Ugandan and Tanzania governments and has drawn criticism from international environmental groups and communities along the proposed route.

UN-appointed experts have joined growing calls for the release of a jailed Egyptian pro-democracy activist whose family says he escalated his hunger and water strike earlier this month.

The experts' call on Friday comes after prison authorities informed the family of Alaa Abdel-Fattah that there was "a medical intervention" with the activist on Thursday. It also comes as Egypt hosts the UN conference on climate change, which has shed light on the country's human rights record.

The experts urged world leaders to raise Abdel-Fattah's case with the Egyptian government. France President Emmanuel Macron and Germany's Chancellor Olaf Scholz addressed the activist's imprisonment in their talks with President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi earlier this week.

Abdel-Fattah is serving a five-year term on charges of spreading false news. The activist has spent much of the past decade in prison on what rights groups say are politically motivated charges.

The UN-appointed experts also called on the Egyptian government to review the cases of other jailed activists on similar charges.

Dozens of environmental activists have gathered inside the UN climate conference venue, protesting against the continued global investment in fossil fuels.

The protesters called for negotiators at the conference, known as COP27, particularly those from the world's largest emitters to pay more to address the impacts of climate change in poorer countries in Africa.

Nigerian Activist Lucky Abeng, from the Pan-African Climate Justice Alliance, said they would continue pressure world leaders to do more for countries who "contribute nothing or less in changing the climate." Africa is responsible for just 4 per cent of global emissions despite making up 17 per cent of the world's population, but is one of the regions most vulnerable to climate change.

"We will continue to make our voices loud," Abeng said. "We will not be intimidated." ___ Scores of countries including the United States, India, Australia, Kenya, and the European Commission have launched a 12-month plan to boost technologies that would help tackle global warming.

On the sidelines of the UN climate talks in Egypt, countries representing over half the world's economy announced dozens of 'priority actions' in the areas of power generation, road transport, agriculture, and steel and hydrogen production. Scientists say that in order to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celesius (2.7 Fahrenheit) by the end of the century, the world economy needs to decarbonize by 2050, meaning only as much greenhouse gas should be released as can be absorbed by natural or artificial means.

US climate envoy John Kerry said in a statement that the plan would bring governments together to "scale critical technologies and create new markets."(AP) RUP