A hundred years ago, Gururudev Tagore wrote in his ‘Kheya’, “...Those in the boat, who were homewards-bound have long sailed home, those who wanted to lay their feet on land have reached by now, those who weren’t quite decided, probably aren’t quite sure where to and how?..” The curtains on the grand event finally came down in the Rs 2700 crore plush ‘Bharat Mandapam’ at Delhi, with mostly all of the 20 participating G20 leaders happy. Happy with the spectacular laser beam shows, bright (even garish at times, looking almost like a Bollywood multi-crore destination wedding), the food with millets, etc. Be that as it may, every leader present – from Biden to Sunak from Macron to Trudeau, from Anthony Albanese to Fumio Kishida and from Sergai Lavrov to Li Quang everybody went home, mostly happy some (especially the last named two) seemingly indifferent and undecided, following Tagore’s words in his ‘Kheya’!
I thought I’ll take a look at the ‘last-line’ – what we and 19 nations + a Union of 53 achieved really, at this spectacular jamboree.
But, before I get down to my task, as always, I’ll rather look back and take an account of the last summit at Bali! And at each step where we stand today under our Presidency, just to take a reading of the professional seriousness of this Group of 20 Nations of high esteem!
That declaration also had ‘condemned the Ukraine War causing immense human sufferings and exacerbating existing fragilities in the global economy - constraining growth,’ (I must add here that the G20 is not a forum for security issues, but it does bear significant consequences for the global economy, a top agenda for this group). But nothing much happened in the year that went by – status quo, not even a NATO entry for Zelensky, other members happily entered into bilaterals with Russia. Nineteen Nations couldn’t ‘name’ one country in its joint-declaration! And the inevitable question on ‘Today’s era must not be of war’!
Commitments to strengthen actions to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030 and actions of Convention on Biological Diversity Parties on the subject, post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework at COP-15. Scaling up efforts to combat biodiversity loss, deforestation, desertification, land degradation and drought, as well as restoring degraded land to achieve land degradation neutrality now by 2030, and in support of the G20’s ambition to reduce land degradation by 50% by 2040 on a voluntary basis. “We recognize the effort made by a number of countries to ensure that at least 30% of global land and at least 30% of the global ocean and seas are conserved,” was all that we had! Everything of it is there also, in various different rich English language – what I missed is the maths and accounts part achieved during the year that went by, how much of funds came in, (say the $200 million “Adaptation Fund” for losses and damages in developing nations? (the $100 million by 2020 not met four years after!) What are the projects? What are the mile-stones to reach 2030 and 2050 and where are we today? How much resources do we generate? I thought the G20 is more than the COP28 the most suitable forum to fix up and monitor progress! On ground levels here, we didn’t even agree we have five tigers say, in our little jewel of a State and we can’t earmark the mandated lands as tiger reserve! Joshimath is still sinking and Nainital is a question mark, as in reports!
I couldn’t find anything tangible on unilateral carbon-taxes to be imposed by the European Union, the US, and other industrialized countries. In one go, India’s ‘patronage’ of the Global South somewhat seemingly tripped! The summit did not regrettably, reach a consensus on the phase-out of fossil fuels, despite a United Nations report categorizing this phase-out as ‘indispensable’ for achieving net-zero emissions. (The G20 nations collectively contribute to approximately 80 percent of global emissions).
On this, the agreement with the US to jointly set up a 1-billion Energy Transition Fund is a great idea, I’m waiting for the Union Budget next, to see how we make a start. Unfortunately, time is running out!
My Take: I don’t think anybody expects too much of ‘achievements’ from these international 7-star luxury events, but optics in international politics do matter. In both the break-away discussions and also inside the summit, I think it was great to finally have the African Union (of 53 nations) on board, that’s the region for environment, raw materials and logistics – the Global South! The International Solar Alliance – a great future, I don’t lay much seriousness on semantics eg trebling renewable energy and green hydrogen, when most of us wouldn’t be there around.
I see great hope in the proposed renewed ‘Spice Route,’ the India-Middle East-EU Economic Corridor (the IMEE-EC). At this stage let’s not gloat too much and compare with other similar projects like the Belt & Roads Initiative, but let’s start the resource planning. I think it’s the project of tomorrow largely conceived by India, with the US and the Western Europe showing great enthusiasm in it!
Honestly, I could not make out too much on vague Intention Statements like ‘Focus on Money Laundering and Corruption’ etc – why are some of our rich, still tight with our banks’ money on Western soil? Some enjoying alien citizenship as well – I expected strong condemnation on this area of concern and credibility.
I was a bit disappointed that the international norms and rules on the Crypto were not framed; I found really nobody was even quite prepared, only mentions. When? I wish I knew!
And before I conclude, the Union Cabinet did at the end, as was expected, pass a resolution hailing the success of the Delhi G20 Summit, lauding deservedly the vision of the Prime Minister in setting out various aspects of the theme ‘One Earth, One Family, One Future’! And how I hope that happens; in Gurudev Tagore’s words, let’s...“lay our feet on land”!
(Binayak Datta is a finance professional)