Britain’s Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak holds up a Green briefcase as he arrives for a speech at the COP26 U.N. Climate Summit in Glasgow, Scotland, Wednesday, Nov. 3, 2021.Alberto Pezzali/The Associated Press
Alberta, with largest oil industry, sends fewer to COP than any other energy province
The province with Canada’s largest oil and gas industry has sent one of the country’s smallest delegations to the international climate conference, where emissions from that industry are under scrutiny.
A preliminary list of the Canadian delegation shows Alberta has sent two bureaucrats.
Newfoundland has nine people at the meetings, Manitoba has six and Ontario has four, as does the Northwest Territories. Quebec has 36 representatives. Several Indigenous and environmental groups also have stronger numbers at the meetings, which are setting the world’s path to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels.
Premier Jason Kenney has said he didn’t see the value of one more politician at what he called a “gab fest.”
– The Canadian Press
12:45 p.m. ET
Non-profit group to put spotlight on Indigenous clean energy voices at COP26 summit
As world leaders gather in Glasgow for COP26, they are facing calls to think big.
In sessions this week at the climate change conference in Glasgow, Mr. Harper and three other ICE delegates will be showcasing such projects and making the case that Indigenous communities should have a key role in shaping the future energy landscape.
“We will not meet our climate targets unless Indigenous peoples are empowered – and I think the world needs to hear this and the world really needs to understand this,” Mr. Harper said in an interview from Toronto before he left for Glasgow.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen takes part in a CNN television interview in the Action Zone at COP26 on November 03, 2021 in Glasgow, Scotland.Christopher Furlong/Getty Images
12:00 p.m. ET
Coalition formed to build low-carbon tech market
U.S. climate envoy John Kerry, nearly three dozen large corporations including Apple and Amazon, and the World Economic Forum are launching an alliance to build a market for technologies that generate low levels of carbon dioxide.
The First Movers Coalition announced on Wednesday aims to help companies set their purchasing plans in a way that will “create new market demand for low-carbon technologies,” the World Economic Forum said.
“Technology has given us the tools to reduce our emissions and build a stronger and more inclusive economy of the future,” forum President Borge Brende said. “For innovators and investors to play their part in tackling the climate crisis, they need clear market demand.”
– AP
Chilean Environment Minister Carolina Schmidt meets with the Minga Indigena indigenous at COP26 on November 03, 2021 in Glasgow, Scotland.Christopher Furlong/Getty Images
11:00 a.m. ET
Fears for farming and trade stopped India signing COP26 forest, methane pledges
India did not sign the COP26 pledge to stop deforestation and cut methane gas emissions by 2030 because of its concerns over the impact on trade, on the country’s vast farm sector, and the role of livestock in the rural economy, officials said.
Yesterday, world leaders pledged to stop deforestation by the end of the decade and cut emissions of the potent greenhouse gas methane to help slow climate change.
Agriculture accounts for over 15% of India’s $2.7 trillion economy and employs almost half of the country’s more than 1.3 billion people. Around two-thirds of Indians live in the countryside and India’s large livestock population is central to the country’s agriculture and its village economy. That makes reducing methane emissions, generated by cows’ digestive systems and manure, a major challenge.
– Reuters
Extension Rebellion activists protest in front of JP Morgan premises as they take part in a demonstration against ‘Greenwashing’ near the COP26 U.N. Climate Summit in Glasgow, Scotland, Wednesday, Nov. 3, 2021.Alastair Grant/The Associated Press
10:00 a.m. ET
Kremlin defends climate actions after Biden barb
The Kremlin has rejected U.S. President Joe Biden’s criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin for not attending the U.N. climate conference.
“His tundra is burning — literally, the tundra is burning. He has serious, serious climate problems, and he is mum on willingness to do anything,” Biden said Tuesday of Putin and the wildfires that scorched Siberia this summer.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday that Moscow does not agree with Biden’s characterization. He said the Russian delegation at COP26 actively participated in the summit.
“Russia’s climate action don’t have the goal of being pegged to an event,” Peskov said. “Of course, we are not belittling the significance of the event in Glasgow, but Russia’s actions are consistent, serious and well-thought-through.”
– AP
9:30 a.m. ET
Bank of Canada plans new tools to assess climate impact on economy
The Bank of Canada said on Wednesday that it will develop new models and data sources to better understand how climate change is impacting Canada’s economy, and said it would include these findings in its quarterly forecasts to help markets price risks.
The central bank, in a release tied to the UN’s COP26 global climate summit, said it will assess how more frequent severe weather events and the transition to low-carbon growth affect Canada’s potential output, the labor market and inflation.
“Climate change and the transition to a low-carbon net zero economy will have significant macroeconomic consequences, touching every region and sector of the Canadian and global economies,” the bank said in a statement.
“It will also have implications for structural change, the growth of potential output, and price stability,” it said.
– Reuters
8:30 a.m. ET
Canada loses bid to host corporate sustainability data to Frankfurt at COP26, but gets a secondary hub
Frankfurt has been named as the headquarters of a new global organization responsible for providing companies with standards for reporting sustainability measures – and Montreal will be home to a secondary office.
The locations of the offices for the new International Sustainability Standards Board were announced along with other details of the organization at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow on Wednesday.
The secondary hub in Montreal is consolation prize for Canada. Numerous banks, insurers, pension funds, industry associations and major corporations backed a Canadian bid to host the ISSB, even offering a “welcome fund” to support its operations for an initial period.
As politicians exit, $130 trillion worth of financiers take the stage
With national leaders gone from the U.N. climate conference, attention turned on Wednesday to the state treasuries and the businesses and financiers responsible for carrying out the pledges to cut emissions and build infrastructure.
A main aim of the COP26 talks is to secure enough national promises to cut greenhouse gas emissions – mostly from burning ubiquitous fossil fuels – to avert the worst climate disasters by keeping the rise in the global temperature to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
But how exactly to meet those pledges, particularly in the developing world — is still being worked out. Above all, it will need a lot of money.
Among the most vexing questions are who should pay and how the funds can be channelled through the financial system quickly and effectively. A major goal will be to attract more private money.
The issues are so important that organizers dedicated all of Wednesday for executives and public finance leaders to discuss them.
The Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero – an umbrella group that includes all the major Western banks as well as insurers and asset managers – announced that firms responsible for managing $130 trillion in capital, equivalent to 40% of the world’s financial assets, had signed up to assuming a “fair share” of decarbonisation.
World Bank president David Malpass, Kenyan Minister Ukur Yatani Kanacho, Mark Carney, the former Bank of England governor and now the UN special envoy for climate action and finance, IMF managing director Kristalina Georgieva hold a panel discussion at the COP26 UN Climate Summit in Glasgow on November 3, 2021.DANIEL LEAL-OLIVAS/AFP/Getty Images
6:30 a.m. ET
Climate financing target for 2023 in reach “if we are lucky”
A spate of last-minute pledges from developed countries have made it possible but not certain that a target of $100 billion in climate financing could be reached in 2022, Germany’s state secretary for the environment said on Wednesday.
“We thought already three weeks ago that we would have all the pledges,” he told a news conference with his Canadian counterpart, natural resources minister Jonathan Wilkinson, at the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow.
“But we saw even yesterday from Japan a very substantive announcement… So if we are lucky we can reach $100 billion in 2022 but definitely in 2023.”
Mark Carney says ‘money is here’ for net zero aligned projects
UN climate envoy Mark Carney called on Wednesday for more blended finance facilities to mobilize private finance to help the developing world access climate finance, saying the money was there.
“We need blended finance facilities that don’t mobilize fractions of private capital for the public dollar but multiples … in double digits. There are facilities that are being developed that can do this, we need to scale them dramatically,” he said.
“The money is here but that money needs net zero aligned projects and there’s a way to turn this into a very, very powerful virtuous circle and that’s the challenge.
– Reuters
5:30 a.m. ET
Britain’s Sunak pledges to ‘rewire’ global finance system for net zero
British finance minister Rishi Sunak pledged on Wednesday to “rewire” the global financial system for net zero, saying London will also commit 100 million pounds ($136.19 million) to make climate finance more accessible to developing countries.
Outlining Britain’s strategy over the next five years to the United Nations COP26 climate summit, he said in addition to the 100 million pounds, London would also support a new capital markets mechanism to issue billions of new green bonds.
“Six years ago Paris set the ambition, today in Glasgow we are provided the investment we need to deliver that ambition,” he told an audience in Glasgow.
– Reuters
5:00 a.m. ET
U.S. backs new effort to issue green bonds
The United States on Wednesday announced its support for a new capital market mechanism that will issue investment-grade bonds and raise significant new finance for scaling clean energy and sustainable infrastructure in emerging economies.
Underscoring the urgency of acting to stop global warming, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told the COP26 climate conference in the Scottish city of Glasgow that the United States would join Britain in backing the Climate Investment Funds’ (CIF) new Capital Market Mechanism and its innovative leveraging structure.
She said the initiative would help attract significant new private climate funds and provide $500 million per year for the CIF’s Clean Technology Fund, as well as its new Accelerating Coal Transition investment program.
– Reuters
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Opinion and analysis
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Tens of thousands of people from world leaders to climate protesters are in Glasgow for COP26. Adam Radwanski, The Globe’s climate change columnist, says the size and attention around the summit makes it harder to leave without meaningful agreements on climate action.
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OTTAWA – Canada’s unemployment rate held steady at 6.5 per cent last month as hiring remained weak across the economy.
Statistics Canada’s labour force survey on Friday said employment rose by a modest 15,000 jobs in October.
Business, building and support services saw the largest gain in employment.
Meanwhile, finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing experienced the largest decline.
Many economists see weakness in the job market continuing in the short term, before the Bank of Canada’s interest rate cuts spark a rebound in economic growth next year.
Despite ongoing softness in the labour market, however, strong wage growth has raged on in Canada. Average hourly wages in October grew 4.9 per cent from a year ago, reaching $35.76.
Friday’s report also shed some light on the financial health of households.
According to the agency, 28.8 per cent of Canadians aged 15 or older were living in a household that had difficulty meeting financial needs – like food and housing – in the previous four weeks.
That was down from 33.1 per cent in October 2023 and 35.5 per cent in October 2022, but still above the 20.4 per cent figure recorded in October 2020.
People living in a rented home were more likely to report difficulty meeting financial needs, with nearly four in 10 reporting that was the case.
That compares with just under a quarter of those living in an owned home by a household member.
Immigrants were also more likely to report facing financial strain last month, with about four out of 10 immigrants who landed in the last year doing so.
That compares with about three in 10 more established immigrants and one in four of people born in Canada.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
The Canadian Institute for Health Information says health-care spending in Canada is projected to reach a new high in 2024.
The annual report released Thursday says total health spending is expected to hit $372 billion, or $9,054 per Canadian.
CIHI’s national analysis predicts expenditures will rise by 5.7 per cent in 2024, compared to 4.5 per cent in 2023 and 1.7 per cent in 2022.
This year’s health spending is estimated to represent 12.4 per cent of Canada’s gross domestic product. Excluding two years of the pandemic, it would be the highest ratio in the country’s history.
While it’s not unusual for health expenditures to outpace economic growth, the report says this could be the case for the next several years due to Canada’s growing population and its aging demographic.
Canada’s per capita spending on health care in 2022 was among the highest in the world, but still less than countries such as the United States and Sweden.
The report notes that the Canadian dental and pharmacare plans could push health-care spending even further as more people who previously couldn’t afford these services start using them.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.
As Canadians wake up to news that Donald Trump will return to the White House, the president-elect’s protectionist stance is casting a spotlight on what effect his second term will have on Canada-U.S. economic ties.
Some Canadian business leaders have expressed worry over Trump’s promise to introduce a universal 10 per cent tariff on all American imports.
A Canadian Chamber of Commerce report released last month suggested those tariffs would shrink the Canadian economy, resulting in around $30 billion per year in economic costs.
More than 77 per cent of Canadian exports go to the U.S.
Canada’s manufacturing sector faces the biggest risk should Trump push forward on imposing broad tariffs, said Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters president and CEO Dennis Darby. He said the sector is the “most trade-exposed” within Canada.
“It’s in the U.S.’s best interest, it’s in our best interest, but most importantly for consumers across North America, that we’re able to trade goods, materials, ingredients, as we have under the trade agreements,” Darby said in an interview.
“It’s a more complex or complicated outcome than it would have been with the Democrats, but we’ve had to deal with this before and we’re going to do our best to deal with it again.”
American economists have also warned Trump’s plan could cause inflation and possibly a recession, which could have ripple effects in Canada.
It’s consumers who will ultimately feel the burden of any inflationary effect caused by broad tariffs, said Darby.
“A tariff tends to raise costs, and it ultimately raises prices, so that’s something that we have to be prepared for,” he said.
“It could tilt production mandates. A tariff makes goods more expensive, but on the same token, it also will make inputs for the U.S. more expensive.”
A report last month by TD economist Marc Ercolao said research shows a full-scale implementation of Trump’s tariff plan could lead to a near-five per cent reduction in Canadian export volumes to the U.S. by early-2027, relative to current baseline forecasts.
Retaliation by Canada would also increase costs for domestic producers, and push import volumes lower in the process.
“Slowing import activity mitigates some of the negative net trade impact on total GDP enough to avoid a technical recession, but still produces a period of extended stagnation through 2025 and 2026,” Ercolao said.
Since the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement came into effect in 2020, trade between Canada and the U.S. has surged by 46 per cent, according to the Toronto Region Board of Trade.
With that deal is up for review in 2026, Canadian Chamber of Commerce president and CEO Candace Laing said the Canadian government “must collaborate effectively with the Trump administration to preserve and strengthen our bilateral economic partnership.”
“With an impressive $3.6 billion in daily trade, Canada and the United States are each other’s closest international partners. The secure and efficient flow of goods and people across our border … remains essential for the economies of both countries,” she said in a statement.
“By resisting tariffs and trade barriers that will only raise prices and hurt consumers in both countries, Canada and the United States can strengthen resilient cross-border supply chains that enhance our shared economic security.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 6, 2024.
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