Energy transition should not destroy economies, B20 official says
Mbongeni Mguni | Tuesday November 18, 2025 10:02
Cas Coovadia, CEO of Business Unity South Africa and B20 Sherpa, was speaking at the launch of the South African Business Initiative for Impact, a side-event of the B20 which started here today. The B20 serves as the official G20 dialogue forum with the global business community, bringing together business leaders from G20 member countries and beyond.
Each year, the B20 provides a platform for companies and business organisations to articulate their perspectives on pressing global economic and trade issues. Coovadia, as the B20 Sherpa, acts as the chief negotiator and coordinator, responsible for developing and finalising the B20's policy recommendations and presenting them to the G20 leadership.
Speaking at the side event, Coovadia said while countries in the B20 were agreed on the global need for sustainability, there were more discussions around the pathway to get there. He said countries in the global North were re-looking their strategies towards cleaner energy and the global South needed to map its own way as well.
“Countries to the North are re-looking at the path towards cleaner energy and so the South mustn't be forced to do what the North is doing,” he said. “Our target has got to be what we have actually committed to. “We have to take national imperatives and national priorities into account and we can't destroy economies as we look towards sustainability.”
Coovadia’s remarks underscore the debate that has raged over the years around how the global green transition is being led by countries that have historically been the worst polluters and whose industrialisation has contributed the most to the current climate crisis. Leaders, particularly in Africa which remains under-industrialised and contributes the least to global carbon emissions, have called for a just transition which takes into account these imbalances.
More recently, some developed nations, particularly the United States, have retreated from commitments to the global climate agenda, with President Donald Trump pulling his country out of the Paris Agreement on his first day back in office in January.
The argument from Africa has been that the pace of its green energy transition should be matched with the historical under-industrialisation and the need to help the continent finance its adaptation.
Coovadia said sustainability remained a core agenda in the B20 meetings.
“It means ensuring that our growth will be both inclusive and low emissions. “We cannot afford to choose between job and sustainability. We must both support each other,” he said.
Coovadia said the B20 was the most ideal platform for the global North and global South to sit down and tackle the issues affecting businesses, the economy and citizens around the world, which include climate, inequality and digital transformation.
“These can't be solved in isolation and these aren't just challenges of the global South; these are challenges of the world. “There's inequality and lack of growth in many countries of the North, and that's why we're seeing a lot of disquiet in many of those countries as well. “So the B20 and the G20 are probably the most representative forums where the North and the South sit together, and look at common problems, and try to find common solutions and I think we need to build this and continue to do that,” he said.
South Africa is hosting the first ever G20 meeting to be held on African soil. The regional giant holds the G20 presidency, from its assumption last December to November 30.
Thousands of delegates from across the globe have already arrived in Johannesburg for both the G20 and the B20.