KUALA LUMPUR (Feb 17): Despite the withdrawal of the US — the world’s second largest emitter of greenhouse gases — from the Paris Agreement, Malaysia and the rest of the world must continue the battle against climate change, said Minister of Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability (NRES) Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad at the Post-COP29 Forum 2025 held on Saturday at Sunway University.

The forum was organised by the Malaysian Youth Delegation (MYD), a local youth-led organisation focused on facilitating and educating Malaysian youth on climate policy advocacy, in collaboration with the Sunway Centre for Planetary Health, Sunway University, WWF-Malaysia and GAIA.

“The rest of the world has to forge ahead. We hope and pray that four years along, we will see something positive from the world’s biggest economy,” said the minister during his closing remarks.

Nik Nazmi highlighted the exit of major financial institutions from the Net Zero Banking Alliance, including those based in Canada and Australia that have major exposure to the US market, as a worrying trend.

“It seems that the Asian banks and [banks from] the global south and Europe will have to pick up a lot of responsibilities when it comes to net zero goals. Whether we like it or not, the moment banks are not committed to [net zero], the money will flow back to not-so-green projects that will make [the transition] very challenging,” he said.

Malaysia must translate the outcomes from COP29 into tangible actions, the minister added. Malaysia recently introduced a climate change bill that includes elements of the Paris Agreement, and it is outlining its strategy for the new nationally determined contribution (NDC) targets, which are commitments by countries to reduce emissions, due this year.

“We are in the process of finalising the climate change bill, and we are going through our engagements with the state governments. The target is to bring it to Parliament by the middle of this year if all goes well,” said Nik Nazmi. The National Adaptation Plan, meanwhile, is hoped to be completed by next year.

Last year, negotiations at COP29 ended with a climate finance goal that was seen as insufficient by the developing countries, and decisions made on carbon markets that were seen as too rushed by some observers.

MYD was one of the local organisations that sent youth observers to COP29, which was held in Baku, Azerbajian. During the forum, MYD’s representatives shared their observations on the negotiation outcomes of climate mitigation, adaptation, climate finance and carbon markets at COP29.

Some of the recommendations for Malaysia made by the youth delegates include making a more ambitious NDC conditional on receiving climate finance, considering a more holistic or transformational adaptation plan, and ensuring the country has a high-integrity carbon market while safeguarding national needs.

The next COP (Conference of Parties) will be held in Brazil this year, and it is dubbed the “nature COP”, where there will be a focus on biodiversity, desertification and climate change, which are closely linked.

“We are at a point of crisis. I would say that the hope I had last year was for a closer convergence with the CBD (convention on biological diversity), which not many people follow. Fundamentally, the planet is in crisis. Planetary health is being breached, and one of the key ones is nature,” said WWF-Malaysia director of policy and climate change Lavanya Rama Iyer during the forum’s panel session.

“When nature doesn’t function, the planet becomes unwell, and climate change is one of the symptoms… We need to bring that convergence more closely into the climate space as well.”

On the other hand, while Malaysia is investing in emissions reduction, it must also emphasise on adaptation to climate change impacts.

“Without major action by large emitters like the US and European Union, climate change is going to bite us physically. That’s why I tend to stress on adaptation,” said Khazanah Research Institute deputy director of research Yin Shao Loong, who was one of the panellists.

Another suggestion by panellist Datuk Dr Yap Kok Seng, a fellow of the Academy of Sciences Malaysia and former Malaysian Meteorological Department director general, was for Malaysia to join a negotiating group in COP30 to make its voice heard. The main negotiating groups at COP include the G77 and China, the Least Developed Countries, the Small Island Developing States, the European Union and the Umbrella Group, comprising many developed nations.