This closing session for the two-day COP30 event, Delivery on Human Needs in the 21st Century, focuses on positioning Brazil as a global provider of climate and human-needs driven innovation solutions. Dennis Pamlin opens by reframing Brazil from a country seen mainly through problems—like deforestation and emissions—to one with gigaton-scale potential for exporting solutions through its dynamic cities, tech parks and startups. Speakers emphasize shifting from emission-reduction mindsets to positive-impact agendas centred on human needs. Nitin Arora describes the UN Climate Change Global Innovation Hub’s people-centric innovation approach and the role of cities, clusters and systemic processes. Jeferson Cheriegate highlights Brazil’s technological capacity, entrepreneurial motivation and the need to channel innovation toward global challenges. Márcio Cabral stresses the urgency of building national impact-economy infrastructure and investment mechanisms that reward socio-environmental solutions. The session closes with shared ambitions for COP31, funding structures, and coordinated national and international action.
Speakers
· Jefferson Cheriegate, President, São José dos Campos Technological Innovation Park (PIT)
· Márcio Cabral, Managing Partner, Impact Hub Floripa/São Paulo/Porto Alegre/Cuiaba
· Nitin Arora, Project leader, UNFCCC Global Innovation Hub
· Dennis Pamlin, Executive Director, FL4ALL & Senior Advisor, RISE
Dennis Pamlin (chair)
· Reframes Brazil as a global solution provider, emphasizing its gigaton-scale potential and the importance of shifting global narratives away from deforestation toward innovation.
· Stresses the need to move beyond “going to zero” emissions toward positive-impact agendas, enabling countries and companies to grow through delivering better lives globally.
· Encourages concrete measures such as international acceleration funds, human-needs-centred innovation frameworks, and clearer metrics for flourishing lives.
· Facilitates the discussion on post-SDG goals, arguing that emerging economies—Brazil, India, China—must shape the next global framework.
· Champions the idea of defining global challenges for startups and creating a focused “countdown to COP31” to organise ecosystems around shared priorities.
· Concludes with a call for hope, youth engagement and collaborative innovation as the path to a better future.
Nitin Arora
· Emphasises human-centric innovation based on mobility, healthcare, resilient cities, cooling access, digital inclusion and livelihoods, insisting innovation must align with a 1.5°C pathway.
· Highlights that cities and tech parks—including those in Brazil—are now central to climate transformation by piloting mobility, circularity, digital infrastructure and nature-based solutions.
· Describes UGIH’s systemic innovation workshops, where bottom-up articulation of city needs accelerates context-specific solutions and systemic change.
· Shares insights from the recent Global Innovation Forum in Rio, which convened governors, mayors, researchers and startups to shape collaborative innovation projects.
· Welcomes the Flourishing Lives For All, RISE solution countdown to COP31 as an accountability tool to spotlight pioneers and monitor progress.
· Argues that the next global agenda after the SDGs must adopt a people-first design, shifting innovation from sector-focused (“top-down”) to needs-focused (“bottom-up”).
Jeferson Cheriegate
· Explains PIT’s role in supporting technology-based startups in São José dos Campos, a centre of aerospace technology and advanced engineering in Brazil.
· Observes a generational shift: young Brazilians increasingly want to build innovations with global positive impact, not just achieve zero emissions.
· Highlights Brazil’s transformation from a food importer to a major producer, arguing that technologies improving agriculture and mining have global spill-over benefits.
· Gives examples of Brazilian innovation, such as a mathematical method to measure carbon footprints from company P&Ls, now used in the finance sector.
· Describes PIT’s work connecting large companies and startups, including repurposing aerospace aluminium and enabling circular ecosystems.
· Stresses the need to integrate technology, purpose and economic viability, enabling startups to measure not only economic benefit but their positive impact on human flourishing.
· Proposes a concrete vision for the next year: identify 5–10 global challenges, pair them with financial mechanisms, and mobilise Brazil’s innovation ecosystem around targeted problem-solving.
Márcio Cabral
· Speaks about Brazil’s capacity for technological development, biodiversity-based innovation and scalable entrepreneurship.
· Argues that Brazil lacks the national infrastructure and regulatory frameworks needed for a functioning impact economy that channels capital to socio-environmental startups.
· Notes that many startups do not recognise themselves as impact-oriented because the economy does not yet properly value socio-environmental solutions.
· Highlights deforestation as Brazil’s primary emissions driver and calls for economic models that embrace the forest, enabling investors and companies to see its economic potential.
· Presents the launch of the Tropical Forests Forever Fund, urging major organisations and public institutions to join efforts to protect forests and enable long-term socio-environmental investment.
· Advocates for large-scale acceleration: while Impact Hub has supported ~500 startups, Brazil needs tens of thousands advancing climate and social solutions.
· Calls for redefining economic success and providing clear investment categories, patient capital structures, and legal frameworks that enable impact-driven businesses to prosper.
(Audio translations and summaries by ChatGPT 5.1)