Climate Action

This policy brief reviews trends and impacts of wildfires on sustainable development, in all its environmental, economic and social dimensions. It provides an analysis of the key drivers of wildfires and proposes measures to reduce the risk and impacts of future wildfires.

Climate change is already impacting negatively on the health and well-being of individuals across the globe, and this burden is likely to become more important and debilitating over time. Due to deep-rooted systemic inequalities, the growing negative consequences disproportionately affect diverse women, girls and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) people. The same structural and cultural factors that render them more vulnerable also limit their meaningful participation in mitigation and adaptation planning and marginalize their needs. This policy brief argues the case that to enable gender-transformative, intersectional and rights-based approaches, climate change, gender and other social determinants of health must therefore be considered and addressed jointly where possible. A systems-based approach can improve the understanding of important synergies and co-benefits, feedback loops, trade-offs and unanticipated consequences that are critical to priority-setting and effective responses. It can also foster critically needed cross-sectoral collaboration among the policymakers and advocates who work on climate, health and gender equality.

Development discourse has long acknowledged the disproportionate impact of climate change and its implications for women and other marginalized social groups and has called for gender-responsive and inclusive climate action in international, national and local arenas. However, some countries are still pursuing development trajectories that fall short on gender sensitivity and social inclusion, worsening the impacts on women and marginalized groups while hindering resilience-building efforts. Given Sri Lanka’s heightened climate vulnerability and the exacerbated climate risks on women and other socially excluded demographics, and responding to the call for action in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) process and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, this brief examines the level to which Sri Lanka’s development and climate policies and strategies integrate a gender and social inclusion approach in comparison to regional peers. Drawing on this work, this brief then provides recommendations to improve the climate policy landscape of Sri Lanka, including the gender-responsiveness of such work, to inform the country’s ongoing National Climate Change Policy revisions.

Governments that consider risk in policymaking and successfully integrate risk management into their governance frameworks and development have a better record of DRR and resilience building. Climate change is already changing the frequency and intensity of natural hazards, as well as increasing the vulnerabilities of countries in special situations including Small Island Developing States (SIDS). Ensuring risk-informed governance for climate action requires citizen-centric approach through the whole-of-society and whole-of-government approaches including the leverage of government innovation and frontier technologies for DRR and resilience. Emerging trends globally show that there is a stark upsurge in the number of disasters in this century compared to the previous one. Over the past two decades, climate-related disasters have nearly doubled compared to the preceding twenty years, affecting more than 4 billion people.

The twenty-eighth session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change provides an opportunity to assess progress in decarbonization efforts in the shipping sector and adds further momentum to carbon reduction actions. As noted in this policy brief, taking swift measures to reduce the carbon footprint of this sector is instrumental’, given the economic role of the sector and the potential for the current carbon footprint to grow in tandem with global economic growth and trade expansion.

Risk-informed governance and a strong risk management framework are essential for ensuring disaster risk reduction (DRR) and resilience in rapidly changing and complex world. Governments and public institutions can use risk informed strategies for efficient decision-making and policy formulation in a world characterized by emerging challenges such as climate change, economic volatility, food insecurity and global health crises. Risk management is a key strategy to implement the principle of sound policy making, one of the 11 principles of effective governance for sustainable development. “Effective risk communication along the risk policy cycle is considered highly relevant for successful risk management, from prevention to response, preparation, review and monitoring of diverse risks.”

The planetary crisis is the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced, an existential threat calling into question the future of civilization. Unless collective action is taken to halt and reverse the decline of the planet’s ecosystems, the road to 2030 will be defined by accelerating levels of social vulnerability, poverty and crisis. The polycrisis experienced in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region over the past decade is a case in point, providing critical insights on the role of ecological change in the emergence of complex multidimensional crises. This paper explores lessons and insights from a new generation of integrated local solutions that have emerged across the region to manage risks and build resilience and makes the case for a new systems orientation to development paradigms and practice to achieve goals of transformational change. In moving towards 2030, a new paradigm is needed in which development is seen no longer as a linear set of goals and targets but as the emergent property of a complex socioecological system.

In recent years, the Government of Costa Rica has recognized the importance of promoting gender equality and women empowerment in the conservation and sustainable use of forests. Costa Rica recognizes that promoting gender equality implies not only mentioning the issue as a priority or as a principle, but also prioritizing the identification of relevant gender inequalities and proposing concrete actions to address them. This brief examines how the Government of Costa Rica, with support from UNDP, is addressing prevalent gender gaps, empowering women in the environmental sector, and comprehensively integrating gender into environmental policies, governance and finance. This, in turn, has resulted in an innovative and gender-responsive offer of environmental incentives in the country that are scaling up results at an influential level, simultaneously increasing women’s economic empowerment, promoting sustainable use of forests and combating climate change.

The policy brief highlights the essentiality of women in agriculture and their potential role in shifting to sustainable agriculture, increasing food security and increasing agricultural productivity when they have access and ability to adopt innovative agriculture techniques such as climate-smart agriculture practices (CSA). This policy brief identifies key actions that can remove barriers or women in agriculture, including collection of gender disaggregated data for gender-sensitive planning, research analysis, advocacy for equitable access to productive assets, capacity building and awareness raising, and cross-sector collaborations to enable gender-equitable access to infrastructure, financial capital, productive assets and other services.

Electronic commerce (e-commerce) is reshaping the global economy, transforming consumption patterns while driving economic growth. The value of the sector rivals that of global trade in goods and services, and keeps expanding. E-commerce platforms help millions of businesses, many of which are small and medium-sized enterprises, sell online, overcoming barriers such as physical market access, infrastructure gaps and social constraints. However, the benefits of e-commerce remain uneven, with most developing countries lagging in the adoption of online shopping. It is also critical to ensure that this global transformation does not compromise environmental sustainability. The environmental impact of e-commerce depends on the type; business-to-consumer e-commerce implies a growing number of smaller packages, deliveries and returns, while business-to-business e-commerce may be more efficient, with bulk orders requiring less packaging and allowing for streamlined delivery. The different stages of the business-to-consumer e-commerce logistics chain for goods (warehousing, packaging, transport, returns) are examined in this policy brief, along with changing consumer behaviour. In addition, the need to rethink these elements is highlighted, to reduce the environmental footprint of e-commerce, while creating a regulatory framework that balances environmental sustainability with economic growth.

Climate change is the defining issue of our time, and we are at a critical moment. It intensifies heatwaves, droughts, flooding, wildfires and famines, while threatening to submerge low-lying countries and cities and drive more species to extinction. It also threatens food supply and food security. The Climate Change 2023 Synthesis Report of the IPCC1 highlights the unequal contributions to global greenhouse gas emissions, driven by unsustainable energy and land use, as well as consumption patterns. Human-caused climate change is already impacting weather extremes globally, leading to widespread adverse impacts, especially affecting vulnerable communities. Tackling climate change demands a paradigm shift in mitigation and adaptation measures, policy coherence, institutional arrangements, and coordination across national, regional, and local levels. Multilevel governance, including commonly used strategies to operationalize the principle of subsidiarity, is foundational to the global effort to combat climate change, recognizing that effective action requires collaboration and coordination across various levels of government, as well as with non-state actors. The principle of equity needs to be applied to the design of existing multilevel governance arrangements for addressing climate change, particularly when costs and benefits are often highly concentrated. It emphasizes the importance of considering equity in decision-making processes and the allocation of resources to address climate change effectively and fairly.

The rapid adoption of renewable energy technologies and the transition away from fossil fuels are vital for combating climate change. Achieving net-zero carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by 2050 will require much faster deployment of clean energy technologies, including wind turbines, solar panels, electric vehicles (EVs) and battery storage systems. This shift is fueling a sharp rise in demand for critical energy transition minerals such as copper, cobalt, lithium, nickel, and rare earth elements, particularly as developing countries work to achieve universal energy access and diversify their economies. For instance, an onshore wind power plant requires nine times more mineral inputs than a gas-fired plant of the same capacity, while an EV needs six times more minerals than a conventional car. Additionally, the average mineral requirement for new power generation capacity increased by 50 per cent during the 2010s, driven by the growing share of renewables in total capacity additions. Against this backdrop, countries rich in critical mineral resources have an opportunity to unlock significant development benefits. These minerals can attract foreign and domestic investment, create jobs, and boost fiscal revenues, exports, and overall economic growth. However, quantifying the economic scale of the mining industry remains challenging, especially due to the volatility of mineral prices, which directly impact valuations.

The recent confluence of crises – the COVID-19 pandemic, violent conflicts, and climate change – has caused severe setbacks to central objectives of social development, such as poverty eradication, employment generation, inequality reduction, and building inclusive societies. People and societies in vulnerable situations have been hit the hardest by the converging crises. There are indications that shocks and crises are becoming ever more frequent, severe, and far-reaching – driven by the worsening effects of climate change, the growing probability of pandemics, growing geopolitical tensions, and increasingly dense global networks of trade, finance and transport. The effects of these converging crises can be severe and long-lasting, as they may exhaust public and private response capacities, cause economic scarring, and trap people in a cycle of poverty. The World Social Report (WSR 2024) estimates that the potential cumulative global economic output loss could be over $50 trillion in the 2020–2030 period, an indication of lost opportunities for social development. National social protection mechanisms can help to protect and further advance social development. These mechanisms, by limiting the adverse impacts of shocks and crises, especially on people in vulnerable situations, and by supporting short-term recovery, enhance longer-term resilience and foster sustainable and inclusive growth. Yet only 47 per cent of the global population and as few as 13 per cent in low-income countries, are estimated to have access to at least one social protection benefit. At the same time, converging crises may increase the cost of providing adequate and universal social protection, while also depleting public financial resources. As a result, many developing countries, including most low- and lower-middle-income countries, would find it difficult to achieve universal social protection by 2030 without additional international support

The Accelerator Lab conducted an online survey to collect data on segregation and recycling, particularly of plastic. This report highlights some key results. Results suggest that households and businesses prefer their recyclable waste to be collected at their doorsteps, instead of taking it to recycling points. Typically, this is linked to issues of accessibility (location of recycling points), affordability (perceived costs of the journey to recycling points - including time), and the existence of alternatives (including whether there is a recyclable waste collection service in place).