The most heart-wrenching thing about the assembly of nations in Santa Marta, Colombia this week, has been to hear from country after country describing the impacts their people are already suffering from floods and fires, rising seas and rising heat. The most humbling has been to hear from nation after nation, so much poorer than ours and facing wildly greater challenges, but nevertheless committed to tackling the phase-out of fossil fuels.

Colombia gathered nearly 60 countries, as well as scientists and Indigenous representatives, researchers and civil society groups at the coal port city of Santa Marta to begin charting an end to the production and burning of fossil fuels. Many came from the Global South, along with Europe’s largest economies and other rich countries. Canada made a quiet appearance (it was the only country that could not bring itself to utter the words “fossil fuels” at a fossil fuel conference).

From the vantage point of Canada, it is easy to assume that the fight against global warming has slipped from the global agenda; that the immediate menace of US President Donald Trump requires us to double down on oil and gas, pipelines and fracking; that the fate of the world can wait, while we worry about the end of the quarter.

But the First International Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels revealed just how blinkered and insular that perspective is. Countries facing threats and shocks far greater than ours are not rushing deeper into petro-dependency, but instead struggling to balance current crises with future safety and security.

Imagine, if you can, running the government of Colombia, the host of the Santa Marta conference. You face ongoing rebel attacks and narcotrafficking. Despite significant progress, inequality and poverty are burning priorities. Your neighbouring government was just decapitated by the United States in an open bid to control its oil reserves. The world is embroiled in an energy crisis and your largest export earnings come from oil and coal. 

Would you have the breadth of mind, the foresight or the government bandwidth to lead a coalition of........

© National Observer