Protests ahead of the 1st Conference Transitioning away from Fossil Fuels. Credit: Kefas Matos

By Umar Manzoor Shah
SRINAGAR, Apr 24 2026 (IPS)

A high-stakes international summit in Colombia starting today (April 24) is expected to sharpen global efforts to phase out fossil fuels, as governments, scientists and Indigenous leaders warn that the world is running out of time to avert irreversible climate damage.

During a virtual press briefing on April 16, Colombia’s Environment Ministry and a diverse panel of experts outlined expectations from the upcoming Fossil Fuel Phase-Out Summit in Santa Marta. The event is being positioned as a critical platform to accelerate energy transition and address mounting pressure from Indigenous communities living on the frontlines of extraction.

It was at the Belém Climate Conference in 2025, wherein a coalition of over 80 countries unanimously decided to act decisively to phase out fossil fuels that have been driving three quarters of global greenhouse gas emissions.

On the sidelines, 24 countries went further: they issued the Belém Declaration, pledging to work collectively toward a just, orderly, and equitable transition aligned with 1.5°C pathways. To this end, Colombia and the Netherlands volunteered to co-host the First International Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels.

The Conference is taking place from 24 to 29 April 2026 in Santa Marta, Colombia. The organisers invited 97 national governments and 30 subnational governments. The high-level segment convenes on April 28–29, 2026.

“We are in a moment of no return. It is clear that there is climate change and that there is no denialism. This is the moment… to accelerate the transition and the progressive elimination of fossil fuels,” said Luz Dary Carmona Moreno, Colombia’s Vice Minister for Environmental Land Use Planning.

The summit comes at a time of growing geopolitical tension and continued global dependence on fossil fuels. Carmona noted that conflicts and economic instability continue to be shaped by oil, gas, and coal and stressed that there is an urgent need for structural change.

“The economy continues depending on fossil fuels,” she said, pointing to global crises that reflect the entrenched role of hydrocarbons.

Colombia has framed the Santa Marta conference around three strategic pillars. The first focuses on overcoming global dependence on fossil fuels. The second addresses transformation of supply and demand systems. The third seeks to rethink multilateral cooperation frameworks.

Carmona emphasised that the conference aims to produce a concrete roadmap, backed by science, public participation, and political will.

“This conference seeks common points to accelerate the transition, concrete actions and enablers that allow that acceleration,” she said.

The event has already drawn strong international participation. According to Colombian officials, 45 countries have confirmed attendance, along with 13 ministers and a broad coalition of civil society groups, indigenous organisations, academics, and private sector actors.

More than 2,800 participants, including grassroots organisations, Indigenous communities, youth groups, and labour unions, have registered to take part.

Indigenous Leaders Warn of “Unjust Transition”

For Indigenous leaders, however, the urgency of the climate crisis is matched by frustration over what they describe as a gap between rhetoric and reality.

Oswaldo Muca, General Coordinator of the Organisation of Indigenous Peoples of the Colombian Amazon (OPIAC), said communities continue to bear the brunt of extraction despite promises of a “just transition”.

“We are very concerned. We talk about a just transition, but in practice it is not true,” Muca said.

He described ongoing environmental degradation in Indigenous territories, including illegal mining, deforestation and mercury contamination.

“Mining continues. Extraction continues. Deforestation continues. The territories and Indigenous peoples continue suffering this problem, and it is becoming more serious every day,” he said.

Muca also criticised the lack of direct benefits for local communities, noting that profits from extraction often leave the country while environmental damage remains.

“The resources do not reach Indigenous territories but they destroy the territory and leave the damage,” he said.

He called for Indigenous participation at every stage of policymaking, from design to implementation, across technical, political, legal and financial dimensions.

Science Points to Sharp Cuts

Scientific findings presented during the briefing reinforced the scale of transformation required.

Dr Marcel Llavero Pasquina, a researcher at the University of Barcelona, said limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius would require drastic reductions in fossil fuel production.

“Eighty-six percent of oil and gas reserves currently under production should be prematurely decommissioned,” he said.

Even under a less ambitious 2-degree scenario, at least 12% of producing reserves would need to be phased out.

Pasquina also warned that no new fossil fuel exploration is compatible with global climate targets. “At least 10,000 of the existing oil and gas extraction contracts should be cancelled,” he said.

He highlighted the economic tensions shaping climate negotiations, noting that fossil fuel companies stand to lose trillions of dollars under transition scenarios.

“Fossil fuel companies… have a material and quantifiable conflict of interest,” he said, arguing they should be excluded from climate policymaking.

At the same time, governments face significant fiscal challenges, with potential revenue losses estimated at US$117 trillion globally under a 1.5-degree pathway. Still, Pasquina stressed that these costs are outweighed by the human and environmental toll of inaction.

“These transition costs are dwarfed by the climate costs communities would otherwise suffer,” he said.

Policy Momentum Builds

Despite the scale of the challenge, policy experts pointed to growing momentum worldwide.

Paola Yanguas Parra, a policy advisor at the International Institute for Sustainable Development, said governments have already begun implementing measures to restrict fossil fuel expansion.

“We found… 58 active restrictions, which go from bans and moratoria to exploration and licensing,” she said.

These measures include protections for ecologically and culturally significant areas such as the Amazon, as well as restrictions on extraction methods like fracking.

Yanguas Parra noted that such policies often make economic sense in addition to environmental benefits.

“You would take a huge environmental, social and climate cost… for something that would not even make you enough profit,” she said, referring to unviable extraction projects in remote regions.

She added that the summit offers an opportunity to shift global discussions from whether to transition away from fossil fuels to how to implement that transition effectively.

“This coalition will focus on implementation, on learning from each other,” she said.

Amazon at a Crossroads

Speakers from across the Amazon basin warned that the region is increasingly being treated as a new frontier for fossil fuel expansion.

Alana Manchineri, an Indigenous leader from Brazil, described the climate crisis as an immediate reality rather than a distant threat.

“There is no more space for delays,” she said.

She warned that oil and gas projects are already causing widespread damage, including water contamination, biodiversity loss and rising conflict.

“It is not just environmental damage but violations of rights and ways of life,” she said.

According to Indigenous organisations, more than 320,000 square kilometres of Indigenous land in the Amazon basin are already affected by oil and gas blocks.

Manchineri stressed that any transition must fully incorporate Indigenous knowledge and leadership.

“This path will only be legitimate and effective with the full participation of Indigenous peoples,” she said.

Beyond COP: Complement, Not Replacement

Panellists repeatedly emphasised that the Santa Marta summit is not intended to replace existing UN climate processes but to complement them.

“There are groups of countries… that have gathered to discuss more focused issues,” Yanguas Parra said, describing the summit as part of a broader ecosystem of climate cooperation.

Pasquina offered a more critical view, arguing that while UN climate negotiations have produced frameworks like the Paris Agreement, they have failed to curb rising emissions.

“The COP  has been a great success on paper. In reality, emissions have only been increasing,” he said.

He suggested that initiatives like Santa Marta could increase pressure on countries that have resisted stronger action.

A Test of Political Will

As preparations intensify, expectations for the summit remain high. Colombian officials say the final outcome will be a report outlining actionable steps and mechanisms to accelerate transition.

“We want the report not to remain just another document. We expect people to turn it into action,” Carmona said.

For many participants, the success of the summit will depend on whether it delivers concrete commitments rather than broad declarations.

Indigenous leaders, in particular, say the credibility of the process hinges on real inclusion and tangible change on the ground.

“If we do not take real and effective actions. We can talk about a just transition, but in reality, other mechanisms will continue destroying the territory,” Muca warned.

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A drought stressed maize crop on Leo De Jong's farm, in the Netherlands. De Jong says he spends between 20,000 and 25,000 Euros per week on irrigation. Credit: Friday Phiri/IPS

By Friday Phiri
WAGENINGEN, The Netherlands, Sep 5 2018 (IPS)

“This season, the month of May was particularly hot and dry,” says Leo De Jong, a commercial farmer in Zeewolde, in Flevopolder, the Netherlands. Flevopolder is in the province of Flevoland, the largest site of land reclamation in the world. Here a hectare of land costs up to 100,000 Euros. “At the moment, we are spending between 20,000 and 25,000 Euros per week on irrigation.”

While most reports point to developing nations being the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change, it is slowly emerging that farmers in the North who generally have more resources are feeling the heat too.

From incessant wild fires and powerful hurricanes in the United States and the Caribbean, to record-breaking high temperatures and droughts in Europe and Asia, the scientific community is unanimously in agreement that climate change is the more likely cause of these extremes in weather.

And it is causing severe disruptions to agricultural production systems, the environment and biodiversity.

This is troubling as, according to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a rise in temperature of more than 2°C could exacerbate the existing food deficit and prevent the majority of African countries from attaining their Sustainable Development Goals on poverty and hunger.

While De Jong can afford spending thousands of Euros on irrigation each week, he knows it is no longer sustainable for his farming business. He currently grows potatoes, onions and wheat, among other crops, on 170 hectares of reclaimed land.

Leo De Jong in his potato field, in the Netherlands. Credit: Friday Phiri/IPS

Soil health emerges as key

With 18 million inhabitants, the Netherlands is densely populated. Half of the Netherlands is below sea level, but part of the sea was reclaimed for agricultural purposes.

After a flood in 1916, the Dutch government decided that the Zuiderzee, an inland sea within the Netherlands, would be enclosed and reclaimed. And later, the Afsluitdijk was completed—a 32 kilometre dyke which closed off the sea completely. Between 1940 and 1968, part of this enclosed inland sea was converted into land and in 1986 it became the newest province of the Netherlands—Flevoland.

Soil health in the Flevopolder, Flevoland, which sits about four meters below sea level, is of particular importance. De Jong sees it as a hallmark for every farmer in this era of climate change, regardless of their location.

He believes the answer to the climate challenge lies in farmers’ ability to “balance between ecology and economy.” This, he tells IPS, can be achieved through various ways such as improved and efficient irrigation technology, research and innovation, as well as farmer-to-farmer knowledge exchanges like the one to which he belongs—the Skylark Foundation. At the foundation he exchanges knowledge with a group of colleagues, mainly focusing on soil health.

“I have a feeling that the climate is getting extreme but consistent usage of manure, cover crops and other efficient sustainable practices guarantees good soil health, and soil health is the hallmark on which sustainable crop production is built.”

Similarly, Peter Appelman, who specialises in farming broccoli and cabbage, agrees with the soil health argument.

Appelman says that farmers should not be preoccupied with the various systems (conventional and organic farming) currently being propagated by researchers. He says that farmers should rather adopt systems that work for them depending on the type of soils on their farms.

“We have stopped feeding the crop but the soil,” he tells IPS, pointing at a pile of composite manure. “I am not an organic farmer but I try to be sustainable in whatever way because this comes back to you. You can’t grow a good product in bad soil.”

Market access for sustainability

In addressing the production cost side of the business, Appelman points to consumer satisfaction and predictable markets as key enablers to farmers’ sustainability in this era of climate stress.

As consumer preferences become more obvious, Appelman says farmers should not expend their energies complaining about market access and growing consumer demands but should rather work hard to satisfy them.

“I think my fellow farmers complain too much, which is not the best practice for the business,” he says. “As farmers, we should exert this energy in looking for customers, and work to satisfy them—I believe better farmer-to-customer relations should be the way forward.”

According to Appelman, production should be determined by consumer/market preferences. “I travel around the world looking for markets, and through these interactions, I learn and do my work according to the needs of my customers. Look for customers first and then proceed to produce for them, because it is tough in the production stage,” says Appelman, whose farm has an annual turn-over of about two million Euros.

The Appelman family grow broccoli on 170 hectares and red and white cabbage on 60 hectares.

Research and innovation

According to Professor Louise Fresco, president of the research executive board of Wageningen University in the Netherlands, the answer to the global food challenge lies in ensuring that the contribution of agriculture to climate change is positive rather than negative.

This, she says, is only possible through investment in research and innovation in order to achieve maximum efficiency for food production and to minimise waste.

“The agriculture sector therefore needs to do more than produce food—but produce efficiently,” she said in her opening address to the 2018 International Federation of Agricultural Journalists congress held in the Netherlands in July. “Food has to be produced not as a chain, but in a circular way. Water and energy use are highlights.”

Under the theme: Dutch roots—small country, big solutions; the congress highlighted what lies at the centre of the Netherlands’ agricultural prowess.

“Productivity through innovation and efficiency is the answer to why the Netherlands,ca small country, is the second-largest agricultural exporter [in the world],” said Wiebe Draijer, chief executive officer and chairman of Rabobank.

Draijer said Rabobank, which was founded as a cooperative, was happy to be associated with the Dutch agricultural prowess, which is anchored in sustainable and innovative practices.

“In response to the global food challenge, we keep refining our lending modalities to support environmental sustainability. For example, we track farmers that we give loans to to monitor their environmental sustainability practices, and there is an incentive in the form of a discount on their loans.”

Sustainability is the buzz word globally. However, it seems there is much more to be done for farmers to achieve it, especially now that negative effects of climate change are similarly being felt in both the north and the global south.