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By Megan Rowling [[link removed]] | Deputy Climate Editor

Vote for the climate?

From the United States to the United Kingdom, India and Indonesia, national elections will have big ramifications for global climate action in 2024, with polls taking place in several powerful large-emitting countries in a year when scientists expect temperatures to hit the 1.5C warming ceiling for the first time.

The countries holding 2024 elections are home to some two billion voters and are responsible for more than 40% of the world's planet-heating greenhouse gas emissions. They also include some of its most climate-vulnerable countries like Tuvalu and Pakistan.

For those reasons, we'll be covering how green policies play out in their electoral campaigns - and whether climate change and nature loss are rising up the list of the public's priorities as awareness grows of how those issues affect other spheres of life including health and jobs. Here's a preview from our correspondents [[link removed]].

And this comment piece from the head of journalist programmes at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism explains why the media’s reporting of elections [[link removed]] will be critical in informing voters and policy signals on climate change.

A recent study by the institute found an appetite for objective, independent spokespeople commenting on the climate crisis across the board, with scientists viewed as the most trusted sources of climate information, and politicians and governments the least.

Women come in from the cold

In the Swiss ski resort of Davos last week, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres tried to paint a positive picture of the opportunities for moving forward on the climate challenge, in contrast to the dire state of geopolitics around the world.

People attend the 54th annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, January 17, 2024. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse

At the same time, he stressed the need for international financial reforms to get more money flowing to developing countries so that they can access those opportunities. His mantra of needing to tip the balance towards a fairer system [[link removed]] to tackle the world’s problems applies on all levels - not least to gender.

After Azerbaijan appointed a COP29 organising committee with no women [[link removed]], there was an outcry, pushing the president to add 12 senior female officials who now account for just under 30% of the 41-strong body. [[link removed]] [[link removed]]

In Bangladesh, meanwhile, we reported on how an expected surge in solar power capacity could create thousands of new jobs [[link removed]], with women starting to make their mark when equipped with the right skills.

"These days women are also showing interest in tech-based work," said Farzana Akter Isha, 24, a supervisor at SOLshare, which has an all-female production team. She told our correspondent how she mentors her female colleagues to take on more technical challenges.

Leave no one behind

And as winter brings hopes of freezing fun on the northern hemisphere's ski slopes, it’s fortunate the World Economic Forum wasn't being held in the Indian Kashmiri mountain town of Gulmarg, where snow is in short supply due to El Niño and global warming.

With snowfall in this part of the western Himalayas down by nearly 80% this season, Gulmarg's ski slopes are bare and largely deserted [[link removed]], slashing the incomes of people who depend on winter tourism. Local sledge-drivers and tea-sellers talked of a bleak future if things get worse.

Abdul Rashid, a 45-year-old tea seller, awaits customers near Gulmarg, a Kashmiri winter sports town. The northern Indian region has seen little snowfall this year, Jan. 6, 2024. Thomson Reuters Foundation/Mehran Firdous

This is just one small example of the injustice of the climate crisis, which is deepening as governments and businesses lag in their efforts to rein in warming and help people adapt. The impulse to expose this unfairness has been the driving force of the climate coverage I started at the Thomson Reuters Foundation in the mid-2000s and then developed over the years with our climate editor Laurie Goering.

The time has now come for me to move on - but I shall continue to work on journalism that shows how and why we must tackle inequality if we're to achieve a just green transition that leaves no one behind. There's no alternative if we're serious about making the world a better place.

Thanks for reading,

Megan

This week's top picks What is Brazil's Cerrado - and why should the world care? [[link removed]]

Deforestation has slowed in the Amazon, but concern is growing about losses in the Cerrado savannah as farmers seek new land

Energy efficiency: the net-zero no-brainer that has come of age [[link removed]]

Energy efficiency has been recognised as a key piece of the net-zero puzzle but faster uptake of existing technologies is needed

Displaced Ecuador Indigenous group to go home after eight decades [[link removed]]

Ecuador's evicted Indigenous Siekopai community are set to return to their Amazon rainforest home, vowing to keep oil drilling at bay

Deforestation-free supply chains must protect producer incomes [[link removed]]

A just transition to greener commodities requires more time and investment to help Global South smallholders adapt to EU regulation

Rich nations must compensate Global South for biodiversity loss [[link removed]]

Wealthy nations’ overconsumption is destroying nature, but is often not accounted for by ‘loss and damage’

Climate disclosure rules are expanding. Companies need to keep up [[link removed]]

Many more businesses will soon be obligated to disclose their climate-changing emissions, which could drive action to reduce them

Read all of our coverage here [[link removed]] Editor's pick Green jobs for a just transition [[link removed]]

In this collection, we speak to people blazing a trail in areas from sustainable fashion and ESG investing to climate law and electric vehicles – and ask how things could look different in a world where every job contributes to a greener and fairer future for all.

[[link removed]]Discover more Nature [[link removed]] Climate Risks [[link removed]] Net Zero [[link removed]] Just Transition [[link removed]] Climate Justice [[link removed]] Green Cities [[link removed]] Thank you for reading!

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