Europe raises its 2035 ambition. Latin America can answer with nature.

Capture and quote taken from the Council of the EU, Press release. 5 November 2025.

On 5 November the European Union told the world: by 2035 we want to cut our climate-warming emissions by around 70% compared to 1990. That’s not a distant 2050 promise — it’s a near-term one.

It’s Europe saying before COP30: we’re speeding up.

Seen from Latin America, that raises a fair question: what about us, whose main contribution is not heavy emissions cuts, but protecting the nature that keeps the planet working?

I write this from Sweden, representing Ecuador, and from my work stopping plastic from rivers before it reaches the ocean. And I think the answer is simple: Europe accelerates on mitigation; we respond with ecosystems. But we must make that visible — and financeable.

Our value is ecosystem services

Countries like Ecuador give the world things it cannot replace:

• Forests and páramos that regulate water

• Mangroves that protect coasts and capture carbon

• Marine areas like Galápagos that sustain biodiversity

• Rivers that, if kept clean, prevent plastic from reaching the ocean

  
  

Those are ecosystem services: real functions that support climate stability, food, tourism, even European supply chains. If those ecosystems degrade, everyone pays — including Europe.

So when the EU raises its climate ambition, we should say: “Good. Now recognize and finance the services that our nature provides.”

A practical bridge example: impact certificates for plastic

Here is one very concrete way to do it:

European companies are under pressure to show they are reducing their environmental and plastic footprint. Many of them can reduce only so much at home. But they can compensate the rest by financing real, verified interventions in the places where plastic actually leaks to the ocean — like Ecuador’s rivers and coasts.

That’s where impact certificates (or plastic-leakage reduction certificates) come in:

1. We install and operate technology that intercepts plastic in rivers, or we restore mangroves/coastal systems.

2. We measure the impact — tonnes of plastic avoided, ecosystems restored.

3. A European company buys that certified impact to compensate part of its footprint.

4. The money stays in the territory, improving local resilience and adaptation.

   
   

Result:

• Europe meets higher 2035 ambition with credible international action.

• Ecuador finances adaptation and ecosystem protection without waiting for slow traditional climate finance.

• Communities see benefits now, not in 2040.

  
  

This is not theory — it’s where climate policy, innovation and diplomacy can actually meet.

Adaptation is our climate language

Europe talks about cutting. Latin America must talk about protecting and adapting.

Why? Because we didn’t cause most historical emissions, but we are on the frontline of their consequences: stronger El Niño, floods, coastal erosion, plastic on remote islands.

So our message should be:

“We will do our part in reducing emissions where it makes sense. But our biggest climate contribution is keeping high-value nature alive. Help us finance that.”

And Europe, after announcing a stronger 2035 target, is in a perfect position to say yes.

The diplomatic move

If we arrive at COP30 only saying “we are vulnerable,” we will be heard. If we arrive saying:

• “We protect global ecosystem services,”

• “We can deliver verified environmental impact,”

• “We have mechanisms for European companies to compensate plastic and support adaptation,”

…then we are not just heard — we are partnered.

Europe shows ambition. Latin America shows solutions. That’s climate cooperation.