Impact in a Resource-Constrained World: Lessons from New York
As extreme weather events affect communities around the world, discussions across New York Climate Week and the United Nations General Assembly focused on accelerating climate action against a backdrop of fragmented and scarce funding. The week brought sharp focus to the need to align support behind country priorities, directing limited resources to where they can have the greatest impact.
Amid devastating floods in Nepal and record heat in Europe, leaders pointed to the growing economic and human costs of climate change and to the challenge of financing ambitions set out in Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). Across events, conversations focused on how to mobilize investment for country priorities and strengthen capacity to deliver them. The urgency of moving resources further and faster in the face of escalating impacts underscored the value of coordinating support aligned with country priorities, learning across countries and evidence to guide investment and implementation.
Over the past decade, the NDC Partnership has built a proven infrastructure for global collaboration to strengthen the support and capacity around country-led climate and development action. As a coalition of more than 270 countries and institutions, the NDC Partnership has brought partners together to align support behind country priorities and mobilize technical assistance and capacity building at scale, in direct response to country priorities. This infrastructure helps reduce duplication through stronger coordination and creates a robust base of evidence and experience to inform progressively more effective climate action.
“We are at an inflection point. Countries have put forward the strongest generation of NDCs yet. They have demonstrated greater political ownership, stronger links between climate and national priorities and better data and analytical foundations for decision-making. The conversation has shifted from the ambition of commitments to financing and implementing them,” says NDC Partnership Global Director Pablo Vieira.
“The NDC Partnership brings 10 years of experience building the systems, relationships and trust needed for effective collaboration to support countries’ priorities. Leveraging that infrastructure is critical to capitalizing on the opportunity presented by this generation of NDCs. We need to build on what works and further invest in the infrastructure that enables countries and partners to collaborate effectively.”
In New York, UN Secretary-General António Guterres noted that no country can decarbonize the global economy or shield itself from climate impacts alone. The NDC Partnership was founded on that principle a decade ago. As countries work to implement NDCs, deeper collaboration and effective support will be important to accelerating progress.
The issues that dominated discussions in New York, from climate finance and resilience to country-led implementation, will remain central as countries continue preparations for Pre-COP31 in Fiji and COP31 in Türkiye. As countries focus on implementation, effective coordination will be key to making limited resources go further.