The GAIA Perspectives

Resilience as a Development Imperative: Taking Stock of India’s Industrial Preparedness

As climate extremes intensify and infrastructure systems around the world face unprecedented stress, the global community is grappling with a stark reality that resilience is no longer optional rather an urgent imperative. International frameworks such as the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, as well as the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, both acknowledge the urgency of improving the resiliency of global infrastructure. Despite 2025 marking the 10^th Anniversary of their adoption, progress with respect to the targets has been modest. According to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals 2024 Report, only 17 percent of the targets appear to be on track, with poor infrastructure resilience, financing gaps, and governance challenges being identified as major barriers. Similarly, the midterm review of the Sendai Framework highlights that there has been slow progress with respect to Target D, which aims to “significantly cut disaster-related losses to critical infrastructure and interruptions to essential services by 2030”. In particular, parties have reported that between 2015 and 2023, an average of 92,199 critical infrastructure assets have been damaged annually, with more than 1.6 million basic service facilities being disrupted.

The recent COP30 deliberations witnessed the release of CDRI’s flagship report on Global Infrastructure Resilience, which underscores the importance of three types of capacities, namely, to absorb shock, to respond and to recover from disasters. It highlights that indirect losses resulting from service disruptions of electricity, water supply, etc, are 7.4 times greater than direct damages to infrastructure. The report introduced the concept of resilience dividend, i.e., the range of benefits resulting from investment in infrastructure resilience, including but not limited to avoided asset losses, reduced disruption in services, improved quality and reliability of public services and so on. In fact, over the life span of infrastructure assets, the resilience dividend has generally outweighed the quantum of additional investment required. According to the results of an extensive survey of businesses conducted by CDRI, spread across 60 countries, it was found that 77 percent feel that government policies for reliance are either absent or are inadequately enforced. Additionally, while 87 percent of the surveyed firms have insurance, about 42 percent have only partial coverage for asset and revenue losses.

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The fact that climate-related risks have both direct (physical damage to assets such as plants, equipment, etc.) and indirect (supply chain disruptions, hindrances to logistics, etc.) impacts on industries is well documented. Given their central role as drivers of economic growth, ensuring the resilience of the manufacturing sector to withstand climate shocks is critical. While one key aspect is to assess the risk and exposure, the other is to identify and implement strategies to fortify against potential climate-induced damage. Unfortunately, industrial resiliency planning in India remains at a nascent stage. A recent ICRIER study involving loss and damage estimation for the states of Odisha (cyclone) and Assam (flood) found anecdotal evidence that supports this claim. For instance, the aftermath of Cyclone Fani in Odisha, resulted in the industrial plants suffering extensive damage to buildings, machinery, and inventories, with losses reaching 10-25 percent of productive capital and, in some cases, going as high as 75 percent. However, industry respondents covered as part of a parallel ground truthing survey, claimed that insurance coverage was minimal, forcing them to fall back on savings or borrowing. Businesses also faced prolonged operational disruptions due to power outages, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) network failures, damaged infrastructure, and delays in raw material supply, with recovery periods ranging from a few weeks to several months. In Assam, even units not directly impacted by floods suffered monsoon-related moisture damage to raw materials and inventories, especially in water-sensitive sectors such as cement, coke, and perishable goods. Thus, even though floods and cyclones are annual occurrences for these states, the measures adopted by them to deal with the same are largely rudimentary. For instance, pre-season cleaning of stormwater drains, installing heavy-duty gates to prevent water from entering factory premises, etc. Persistent issues such as partial insurance, delayed claims, inadequate asset coverage, and repeated seasonal disruptions highlight that industrial resilience remains largely reactive and unplanned, underscoring the need for a more structured approach. But if repeated losses can’t move the needle on preparedness, it begs the question, what will?

One possible way around this is for planning to move from a voluntary practice to a mandated requirement, ensuring that firms adhere to some pre-identified standards. Such a measure would not only help assess current resilience levels but would also serve as a basis for prioritising funding flows, incentivising risk-reducing investments, and monitoring progress over time. This framework could be operationalised through a mandatory disclosure mechanism. A useful precedent is the Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) reporting requirement introduced by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), which now mandates the top 1,000 listed companies by market capitalisation to report under the Business Responsibility and Sustainability Reporting (BRSR) framework. It encourages firms to report on environmental risks and/or opportunities they face and the various mitigation or adaptation measures they have adopted to manage the same. Parallely, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is also in the process of formalising the disclosure framework on climate-related financial risks that aims to improve transparency and strengthen the sectors’ ability to identify, assess, and manage risks associated with climate change. Taken together, the evolving reporting architecture reflects an institutional shift towards embedding climate impacts into planning and decision-making.

In conclusion, having established the need for financial resources for resiliency building and having identified avenues of potential beneficiaries of such funds, the next obvious step is to ascertain how these resources should be allocated. For meaningful impact, this would require breaking away from reactionary ad-hoc interventions towards a systematic evidence-based approach that prioritises measures with demonstrable resilience gains. As the country’s regulatory landscape moves towards greater transparency with the forthcoming RBI climate-risk disclosures, there is merit in riding the momentum to develop a resiliency framework for industries. One that is bolstered by sectoral benchmarks and resilience assessments to ensure that climate-induced shocks do not derail long-term growth trajectories.

(Views expressed are authors’ own and don’t reflect those of ICRIER)

Measuring What the Roadmap Misses: Exposure Indices and the New Infrastructure of Climate Finance

The Baku to Belem Roadmap to 1.3T is about mobilising and directing climate finance, yet it says relatively little about how the underlying climate risks are to be measured, compared and fed into economic decision-making. For countries already grappling with rising debt, tightening fiscal space and escalating climate impacts, this is no longer a technical issue, it is also central to both their ability to plan and their leverage in climate finance negotiations.

The report does acknowledge the role of exposure indices and other related metrics but treats them largely as supporting diagnostics. In practice, they need to be understood as core infrastructure for the climate finance system. Without credible, country developed metrics that show how climate hazards are affecting growth, sectoral output and public finances, demands for adaptation finance, loss & damage support remain vulnerable to being dismissed as “aspirational”. With such metrics, especially when grounded in transparent methodologies, these demands can be reframed as responses to quantifiable risks.

Recent work by ICRIER on Estimating the Future Cost of Adaptation for India provides useful illustration of climate risk measurement. The study develops exposure indices for five key climate stresses, namely rainfall variability, floods, droughts, heat stress and sea level rise using national observational data and climate projections. These indices, scaled between zero and one, capture how exposed the country is to each hazard. They are then used to weight sector-wise damage functions drawn from the literature, producing estimates of how much climate change is already shaving off GDP and how this might evolve under different scenarios. Further, it is not enough to measure today’s exposure, countries will increasingly need regularly updated exposure indices linked to standard climate scenarios, so that future trajectories of risk can be built into fiscal planning and long-term investment decisions.

Exposure indices combine long-term climate variables (rainfall patterns, temperature extremes, sea-level trends) with information on who and what (people, land, infrastructure, ecosystems) gets exposed. Flood indices, for example, can blend the share of land inundated with the proportion of population affected, drought indices can draw on precipitation anomalies over several decades, heat indices can capture both the frequency of “heat days” and the intensity of maximum temperatures, and sea-level exposure can integrate coastal elevation and population density. This is directly relevant to the growing ecosystem of climate-related financial sector methodologies. As more climate-related financial sector methodologies are being developed, from stress testing to integration of climate scenarios into macroeconomic modelling and budget forecasts, countries with the least capacities will benefit from institutionalised international collaboration and peer-learning networks, recognising existing challenges such as lack of standardised and quality data resulting in underestimation and only partial measurement of climate-related risks. If these tools evolve without a parallel investment in exposure metrics and data systems, there is a risk that they will function primarily as compliance exercises imposed from outside, rather than as instruments vulnerable countries can use to strengthen their own negotiating position.

At the same time, taking exposure indices seriously exposes just how demanding this agenda is. Even in relatively data-rich settings, constructing robust indices requires long, consistent climate time series data that is harmonised across multiple agencies, high-quality socio-economic and sectoral data at sub-national level, and enough empirical work to link climate variables to outcomes such as labour productivity, health, ecosystem services etc. Many low-income countries are still struggling with basic data gaps for rainfall, temperature, land use or coastal elevation, and their national statistical systems are already stretched thin. Expecting them to match the analytical standards implied by stress-testing and scenario-based fiscal planning, without targeted support, risks deepening existing asymmetries in the climate finance system.

This is precisely where the Roadmap could have been more forward-looking. Rather than a generic call for better vulnerability metrics, it could have recognised climate risk analytics, including exposure indices, as a global public good that requires its own financing and governance arrangements. The emerging GIRI model can be seen as a promising first step in building this kind of shared infrastructure for climate risk measurement, but it will need to be complemented by sustained investment in country-owned data systems and analytics. An ambitious extension of the Baku to Belem agenda would propose an international facility for climate risk measurement and modelling, with three concrete pillars: grant-based support for data collection and statistical capacity in vulnerable countries; open-source toolkits for building exposure indices and embedding them in macro-fiscal and financial models, and structured peer-learning platforms where countries can adapt and improve these tools in practice.

Multilateral development banks and UN agencies would also need to adjust their role. Beyond project finance and policy lending, they could be mandated to co-develop and adopt standards for climate risk measurement, aligning their own risk assessments and country strategies with nationally generated exposure metrics wherever possible. Over time, such convergence could help reduce the current fragmentation of approaches, and limit the space for opaque modelling choices that systematically understate the risks faced by climate-vulnerable states.

Ultimately, this is about credibility as much as capacity. A climate finance architecture that claims to mobilise trillions, but continues to operate with only a partial view of the risks it is addressing, will struggle to convince that resources are being directed where they are most needed. Bringing exposure indices and related climate risk measurement tools into the centre of the Baku to Belem agenda would signal a shift from ad hoc, narrative-based justifications towards a more disciplined, evidence-based approach to needs and priorities. It is not a substitute for the hard political choices on revenue sources or instruments, but it is a necessary complement without which even the most ambitious Roadmap risks remaining a statement of intent rather than a guide to action.

(Views expressed are the author’s own and do not reflect those of ICRIER)

Legacy Mechanisms, New Expectations: A Perspective on the Baku to Belem Roadmap to 1.3T

The recently released report “Report on the Baku to Belem Roadmap to 1.3T” (henceforth referred to as the Roadmap), prepared as part of the COP29 and COP30 Presidencies, is framed as an action-oriented consolidation of existing initiatives and potential leverage points within the international climate finance system. The report realistically acknowledges the tension between its ambition to provide a coherent, systemic guide and the unresolved nature of the political agreements necessary to implement major components of its five action fronts.

While pragmatism is valuable, a good plan should not come at the expense of striving for a truly great one. One feels that the Roadmap relies too heavily on legacy institutions and mechanisms that have historically underperformed or proved politically contentious, which may limit its transformative potential. The point made about systemic fragmentation across climate finance institutions-multilateral climate funds, MDBs, bilateral providers, philanthropies, and regional development banks – is definitely an important one. However, the suggested coordination measures between institutions are largely procedural (e.g., regular meetings, harmonised IT systems). There are deeper structural issues, such as differing risk appetites, conflicting shareholder incentives and mandates, etc., that may hinder attempts made in this direction. A meta-governance structure or accountability architecture is needed to make the proposed coordination mechanisms work.

More attention also needs to be paid to funding access barriers that developing countries have outlined in their submissions to the UNFCCC, while reviewing multilateral climate funds, such as long accreditation timelines, co-financing requirements, and burdensome documentation. This is particularly true for countries in the LDC and SIDS groups, as funding for disaster management (including compensation) and post-disaster reconstruction must be available with immediate effect.

Countries are also unequal in their ability to raise funds from markets due to credit rating biases that penalise climate-vulnerable states, high transaction costs associated with the low ticket size of borrowings, and under-representation of local institutions in many funding decisions. While the preparation of vulnerability indices, etc., that the Roadmap discusses would go a long way toward informing policymakers and ensuring preparedness in the short to medium term, addressing disaster impacts and relief measures requires immediate action and funding support. The Roadmap also places great confidence in MDB capital adequacy reforms, private finance mobilisation, and blended finance solutions. Yet the empirical evidence from the last decade shows that MDBs have miles to go to expand lending at the scale envisioned, and blended finance has mobilised far less private capital than projected. Success stories remain dependent on region, targeted income groups, and sector, with low-income countries often seeing much weaker mobilisation.

aerial view photography of green leaf trees surrounded by body of water at daytime — Photo by Pok Rie on Pexels.com

Looking specifically at the report from the perspective of developing countries desperately seeking options to raise finance for adaptation strategies, the document offers limited options. It correctly surmises that “strengthening adaptation finances lies at the heart of all efforts”, and that existing finance flows are unequivocally dominated by mitigation and large-scale infrastructure projects. However, it must be acknowledged that for mitigation, measurement is easier and returns are more predictable. Building revenue models for adaptation that work remains a tall order. Due to its hyper-local nature, the need for adaptation action, particularly in smaller developing nations, is systematically underreported because of limitations in assessment methodology. Also, post the implementation of projects, monetising the gains, the primary basis for developing a revenue model, is difficult for many sectors.

Taking the specific case of a sector that remains at the heart of adaptation action in India- agriculture. Adaptation action in agriculture may be categorised into various buckets- promoting climate-resilient crops, enhancing food security and nutrition, sustainable and regenerative cultivation, innovation and research, etc. As can be seen, while all of them increase output, which is directly measurable, the marginal benefits of each may not be immediately apparent. In a world of concessional lending (as opposed to grants), developed countries need to find a means to monetise these gains, necessarily to justify borrowings. Otherwise, they run into the risk of unmanageable public finance deficits or under-investments in the macroeconomic sense. On this topic, ICRIER has recently contributed to the chapter on Adaptation Resourcing for the preparation of India’s National Adaptation Plan. Issues such as the necessity of linking public expenditures to outcomes achieved across all eight adaptation sectors have been highlighted there.

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On the issue of different instruments that could raise potential revenue sources, the Roadmap lists carbon pricing, fees on aviation or maritime transport, special drawing rights (SDR) issuance, taxes on luxury commodities, financial transaction tax, wealth taxes, etc., as some of the options. However, the report does not offer a realistic political economy assessment of which countries are likely to support which mechanisms. Given that many of these revenue sources, especially those listed at the end, may be used for other non-climate developmental purposes, there may be tensions while ringfencing them for climate purposes. Careful attention needs to be paid not only to revenue possibilities, but also to tax incidence, existing geopolitical tensions and rifts, and domestic political resistance that may limit its implementation. There is therefore a need to understand these sources through a dynamic general equilibrium lens, and deep-dive assessments are warranted using scenario modelling, sensitivity analysis, and distributional impact analysis. One feels that there is also a missed opportunity to propose new innovative financial mechanisms and instruments.

(Views expressed are the author’s own and do not reflect those of ICRIER)

Setting Adaptation Targets: India’s Strategic Approach to GGA Indicators

As countries gear up for the COP 30 negotiations in Belém, one of the most anticipated discussions would be centred around the finalisation of the indicators for the Global Goal on Adaptation (GGA). What started off as an exhaustive pool of close to 10,000 indicators has iteratively been pruned down to a list of 100, spread across both thematic and dimensional targets as listed in paras 9–10 under Decision 2/CMA 5. Representing a monumental step towards operationalising the United Arab Emirates (UAE)-Belem Work Programme, what shape the indicator list ends up taking will determine not only the effectiveness of GGA assessments globally, but also the flexibility of Parties in aligning indicators with national circumstances and adaptation priorities.

To begin with, for finalising indicators, India could consider categorising them into three groups, namely, positive, flexible, and negative. The first category would include indicators that are already part of existing reporting mechanisms under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) or integrated within domestic policies and programmes. Similarly, the negative list may comprise indicators that would elicit additional efforts for data collection, processing and analysis or may weaken the country’s negotiation stance. And finally, the flexible category, having indicator options that require certain refinement or may not be a hundred percent match to existing data. This would help create a prioritised list on which initial work can begin.

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The idea is not to dismiss any indicator merely because it adds to the reporting burden. Rather, to avoid endorsing indicators without a proper national reporting mechanism at present, as these may prove problematic later on. These include indicators such as “Change in the annual rate of reported heat-related occupational injuries and deaths”, “Proportion of workers in climate-vulnerable economic sectors/activities”, etc. Similarly, there are also cases of indicators that have been developed by third-party agencies and have been included in the GGA indicator set. However, as per India’s official submission on the GGA and the UAE – Belem Work Programme, the country has underscored the importance of using official Party-submitted data for tracking adaptation progress, such as Biennial Update Reports (BURs), National Communications (NATCOMs), etc. This is based on the understanding that reliance on third-party databases may “undermine the transparency and sovereignty of national reporting processes”. A case in point is the indicator “Ecosystem resilience under climate change (measured by the Bioclimatic Ecosystem Resilience Index, BERI)”. This index is a sub-component of the Environmental Performance Index (EPI) developed by Yale and Columbia University. According to an earlier release by the Press Information Bureau, India has expressed reservations against the results of this index on the grounds that the calculations were found to be based on unfounded assumptions.

On the domestic front, initial groundwork as regards climate adaptation has been laid with the submission of the Initial Adaptation Communication to UNFCCC, the National Adaptation Plan (NAP) being set to be released shortly, as well as the release of the Draft Framework of India’s Climate Finance Taxonomy However, despite these headways, what one finds missing is a clear-cut, quantifiable target-setting mechanism with respect to adaptation outcomes. Unlike the case of mitigation, where one has the National Determined Contribution (NDC) targets stipulating a 45% reduction in emissions intensity of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) relative to the 2005 levels and having an installed capacity of 50% electric power installed capacity from non-fossil fuel-based sources by 2030, there is an absence of adaptation targets for India. The closest mention to any form of adaptation “target”, so to speak, in the NDC document is “….To better adapt to climate change by enhancing investments in development programmes in sectors vulnerable to climate change, particularly agriculture, water resources, Himalayan region, coastal regions, health and disaster management…….”. Similarly, the draft climate finance taxonomy document also includes only the agriculture and water sectors under its ambit as far as adaptation is considered and defines adaptation interventions as “….an essential intervention reflected through the focus on enhancing investments in development programmes in sectors that are vulnerable to climate change, particularly agriculture, water resources, the Himalayan region, coastal regions, and health and disaster management…..”. This still leaves many questions unanswered as regards what is to be considered as an adaptation intervention in practice. Bridging this gap requires moving from general intent to specific, measurable outcomes. A good starting point would be identifying a handful of sectors, perhaps those alluded to in the aforementioned documents, for defining targets. For instance, one may consider linking the adoption of early warning systems with improvement in adaptive capacity based on measurable reductions in climate-induced disaster-related losses as one such target. Thus, with the updated NDCs poised for release this year, it is an opportune time to incorporate quantitative targets for adaptation so as to transform intent (present as part of NAP) into action.

climate road landscape people — Photo by Markus Spiske on Pexels.com

The idea is to kill two birds with one stone. The fact that countries are already reporting on a number of adaptation-relevant indicators under existing reporting frameworks, such as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), etc., that are also included as part of the consolidated indicator list, can be leveraged. In other words, countries should self-select options based on national circumstances, aspects that they would want to highlight as part of their respective national adaptation progress. With India’s NAP being set to release shortly, the obvious next step would be to set up a Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) framework that helps track performance periodically. The argument being made here is to pre-emptively align those efforts with the GGA indicator reporting process such that there is coherence

(Views expressed are the authors’ own and do not reflect those of ICRIER)

Do we really need the Conference of the Parties (CoP)?

Now that the thirtieth meeting of the Conference of the Parties (CoP) is drawing near, it would be a good idea to go over the jargons related to climate change and see the latest position with respect to each one of them. This will help us to fortify ourselves adequately to appreciate the next turn of events during CoP30 and after. CoP30 is being held in Brazil (Belem) from the 11^th to 21st of November, 2025 and the venue is considered to be the gateway to the Amazon forests. The several jargons that we need to refresh include the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), the New Collective Quantified Goal on Climate Finance (NCQG), the global stocktake, the global goal on adaptation (GGA) and so on.

Let’s first of all deal with the subject of NDCs. This concept was introduced in the CoP held in Paris (2015) where one moved away from the concept of Common but Differentiated Responsibilities (CBDR) and put the onus on each individual country to formulate its own plans and reduce its carbon footprints. The concept of CBDR had actually forced the developed nations to lay down targets for reduction in carbon emissions. The developing nations were exempted since it was the developed nations which were primarily responsible for climate change, being the main polluters. The countries who were to lay down targets were individually mentioned by the generic name of Annex 1 countries in the Rio de Janeiro declaration (1992) and by the name of Annex B countries in the Kyoto protocol (1997). The countries named in both lists are almost the same but not identical. The developed nations managed to shirk the responsibility placed on their shoulders and spread it equally amongst all nations. There is no denying, however, that unless the developing nations too reduce their carbon footprints, no substantial gain can be made as far as climate change is concerned. The Paris Agreement (PA) had stated that the NDCs would be revised every five years and each subsequent NDC would be made more stringent. Practically all the signatories to the PA had submitted their NDCs and had also revised them around 2020. There was delay, however, due to the pandemic. The NDCs are due for revision now and were to be submitted by February 2025 to give new targets for 2035. Till date, only about 61 countries have submitted their revised NDCs which covers around 31% of the global emissions. Some of the G20 countries who have submitted their revised NDCs include Australia, Brazil, Canada, Japan and the United Kingdom (UK). UK, incidentally, has set up a very challenging target of reducing emissions by 81% from the 1990 figure (by 2035) as against the previous target of a reduction by 68% from the 1990 figure (by 2030). Incidentally, India is yet to submit its revised NDC. Going by reports appearing in several fora, the latest revision of the NDCs falls short of expectations and is not in harmony with the targets laid down in the PA. In any case, even with the NDCs which were submitted after the first revision around 2020, it was apprehended that the earth’s temperature would rise anywhere between 2.5 to 2.9 degrees centigrade (by 2100 compared to the figure in around 1850) as against a target of 1.5 degrees. A fresh assessment would be made after all countries submit their NDCs, hopefully before the next CoP commences.

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Next is the issue of transfer of resources from the developed to the developing world. Way back in 2010 at Cancun (CoP16), it was agreed that a sum of $100 billion per year would be made available to the developing nations. This sum of money was more of a ‘back of the envelope’ calculation without any due diligence. The actual sum required is in trillions of dollars and not billions. Energy transition is a capital-intensive exercise and the developing world has no means to raise this money. The fact is that even this meagre sum of money was not made available even though repeated demands were made in every meeting of the CoP. It needs to be pointed out that the implementation of the plans formulated in the NDCs of the developing world is contingent upon the receipt of funds by way of grants, concessional loans, etc. If transfer of resources does not take place, the rise in the earth’s temperature would be more than what has been estimated. If one goes by the data put out by the OECD countries, an impression is being given that close to a $100 billion has actually been disbursed, at least in the last three to four years. However, this is misleading, as most of the disbursements have been in the form of commercial loans, which do not align with the mandate, since the funds are meant to be provided as grants or concessional loans. The fact that most of the money has gone for mitigation projects (as against adaptation) nails the lie in the OECD data. Mitigation projects have an income stream and hence, the funds of the lenders are secure. Setting up of a solar generation plant would be a mitigation project, whereas developing drought-resistant seeds would be an adaptation project. It has been estimated that only about 10% of the climate finance is directed towards adaptation. So, if at all, climate change has given a window to the developed world to channel its funds to the developing nations in order to earn an income. In the last meeting of the CoP at Azerbaijan, a decision was made that in place of $100 billion, a sum of $300 billion will be made available annually by 2035. If one includes funding from all sources including the private sector, the figure goes up to $1.3 trillion. Actual requirement by the developing world, however, would be at least six times this figure. This resource transfer is now known by a new name, NCQG. In the meantime, some more funds have been constituted, for example, the loss and damage fund (constituted during CoP27 at Sharm El-Sheikh), which will especially cater to the small island states which have suffered extensive damage due to rise in sea level. The available kitty though, is very small (about $ 800 million) and woefully inadequate. Yet another fund has been initiated in the previous CoP (2024) by Azerbaijan called the Climate Finance Action Fund, which aims at raising $ 1 billion. This fund will become operational when at least 10 contributing countries become shareholders. All such funds are merely cosmetic in nature, are voluntary, and do not serve any purpose other than to give the impression that something is being done. What climate change requires is deep pockets and not a plethora of funds whose coffers are almost empty. Not only do these funds (including the NCQG) have no money, the nuts and bolts remain hazy as to who would be the beneficiaries, etc. Deciding that itself will be a herculean task and may consume several rounds of future CoP meetings.

A number of reports have been published in the last few years giving details of how grim the climate situation is and how it is becoming increasingly worse over time. To mention a few reports, we have the UNEP’s Emissions Gap Report (2025), IPCC’s AR6 report, also known as the Global Stock Take Report (2023), UNDP’s Climate Inequality Report (2023), WRI’s State of Climate Action (2025), etc. What needs to be highlighted is that carbon dioxide has reached 422 ppm (in 2024) and experts opine that we need to limit it to 450 ppm if temperature rise has to be contained within 1.5 degrees centigrade. In the year 2023, we added 2.3 ppm, which means that we are going to touch 450 ppm very soon. Closely linked to this is the subject of climate justice. How should the small space that is available to us be used? What should be the share of the developing world in this who in any case have very small per capita emissions? This is a very complicated issue, and by the time it can be resolved, if at all, one would have touched 450 ppm.

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All these issues mentioned in the preceding paragraphs would be discussed during CoP30, but whether a solution will be found or not is anybody’s guess. Brazil has indicated that CoP30 should be known as the ‘Implementation CoP’ where all the ground rules have been laid down, and one now has to work in unison to get matters expedited. Discussions will also be held to finalise the list of indicators for determining the global goal of adaptation, where the number of parameters have been reduced to about 100 odd. A new agenda for discussion is Brazil’s Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) which will be a funding mechanism to incentivise the protection and restoration of tropical and sub-tropical moist broadleaf forests in developing countries. Furthermore, the discussions will likely include the recent verdict of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), delivered a few months ago, which held the developed world responsible for the adverse impacts of climate change. Though this verdict is purely advisory, it’s a shot in the arm for those who are crying for climate justice.

At the end of the day, one really wonders whether there is any meaning in having a yearly meeting of the CoP where a humongous amount of money is spent. Irrespective of what is being touted, actual achievements are minuscule. Carbon emissions are still on the rise. To top it all, countries like the United States keep walking out of the PA despite being the highest cumulative carbon emitter in the world. This is having an adverse demonstration effect on countries that are fence sitters when it comes to dealing with climate change. Nobody wants to talk about climate justice, a sensitive term for the developed world. It has been more than 15 years since the amount of $100 billion a year was decided, and even today, only a small fraction of this is being provided in the form of grants/concessional loans. Technology transfer is almost unheard of. In fact, the subject of climate change is being used to usher in restrictive trade practices, like the carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) of the European Union. Countries are openly canvassing for the use of more fossil fuels, for example, the ‘drill baby drill’ slogan of the United States. One can sense the frustration that is creeping into the minds of the developing world, especially the small island states, which can literally see their land mass being swallowed by the rising sea. Perhaps, the only utility of the CoP meetings is that it keeps putting some pressure on countries who seriously believe that something needs to be done and India is one of them. To sum up, one can safely conclude that the yearly meetings of the CoP will not ensure limiting the temperature rise to 1.5 degrees centigrade by 2100. However, one can take solace from the fact that in case CoP is dissolved, the ill-effects of climate change would be many times more and therefore, it may be in our interest to continue having this ritual every year.

(Views expressed are the author’s own and don’t necessarily reflect those of ICRIER)