Developing countries locked out of low-carbon technology trade.

A new class of low-carbon goods and services forms the essential inputs for the transition to lower-carbon and climate-resilient economic growth paths. By constructing a new dataset of such low-carbon technology (LCT) trade, we found that the vast majority of emerging market and developing countries (not including China) are not part of LCT trade. For the small amount of LCT trade in which developing countries engage, most are net importers. Because developing countries are left out of the production chains for LCT, they struggle to afford to import these technologies and have little chance at building capabilities to produce and export their own LCT. Without considerable technological transfer and longrun affordable investment, the developing world could be locked out of the climate transition in a manner that could lock in a new structure of global inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]