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Climate Change

Climate Change & Sustainable Development

Climate change is an inevitable and urgent global challenge with long-term implications for the sustainable development of all countries. The 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report warns of changing weather patterns and rising sea levels due to accelerating GHG emissions from human activities. For many, a warming climactic system is expected to impact the availability of basic necessities like freshwater, food security, and energy, while efforts to redress climate change, both through adaptation and mitigation, will similarly inform and shape the global development agenda.

The links between climate change and sustainable development are strong. While climate change will know no boundaries, poor and developing countries, particularly the LDCs, will be among those most adversely affected and least able to cope with the anticipated shocks to their social, economic and natural systems. The IPCC projects that by 2080, millions of people will be displaced due to sea-level rise, with densely-populated and low-lying countries, like many SIDS, facing the greatest threat from storm surges and rising seas.

Internationally Agreed Development Goals & Climate Change

Internationally agreed frameworks and goals have set an agenda for integrating climate change and sustainable development. Agenda 21, which addresses climate change under its Chapter 9 (Protection of the atmosphere), recognizes,

that activities that may be undertaken in pursuit of the objectives defined therein should be coordinated with social and economic development in an integrated manner, with a view to avoiding adverse impacts on the latter, taking into full account the legitimate priority needs of developing countries for the achievement of sustained economic growth and the eradication of poverty.

Agenda 21

Both Agenda 21 and the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation (JPOI) assert that the United Nations Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is the key instrument for addressing climate change. The Kyoto Protocol, which entered into force on 16 February 2005, sets binding emission reductions targets for industrialized countries for the first commitment period 2008-2012.

COP15...

Currently Member States are engaged in negotiations with the aim of adopting an outcome at COP15 in December 2009 in Copenhagen, Denmark for post-2012 timeframe. Key issues on the negotiating agenda are adaptation, mitigation, finance and technology. Go to United Nations Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) for more details.

Adaptation; Bridging Climate & Development

Focusing on Technology

Recognizing the serious links between development and climate change and with the world poised for renewed action in the run-up to COP15 in Copenhagen, the Division for Sustainable Development (DSD) of UN DESA is working to accelerate technology transfer in a way that advances both adaptation and the sustainable development in all countries. Progress in the design and transfer of environmentally sound technologies, particularly cleaner energy technologies and technologies for adaptation, will be an essential component of a comprehensive global effort for combating climate change—and for meeting countries’ sustainable and millennium development goals.

With these important objects at stake, DSD is identifying mechanisms for overcoming barriers and obstacles to technology transfer, and improving international cooperation on this important solution.  While UNFCCC agreements contain many references to technology transfer to developing countries, the focus of implementation has generally been on creating conditions in developing countries conducive to foreign investment and building capabilities to absorb and utilize imported technologies. UNDESA-DSD however, is emphasizing measures that Governmental technology suppliers can take to accelerate the distribution and adoption of technology in developing countries. It is also working to identify more effective methods of measuring and verifying the extent of environmentally sound technology transfer.

Lead up to COP15: 2 Key Meetings...

In the lead up to COP15, the DSD is organizing two key meetings where technology for adaptation is the focus. The Beijing High-Level Conference on Climate Change: Technology Development and Technology Transfer was held in November 2008 and its follow-up, the New Delhi High-level Conference on Climate Change: Technology Development and Transfer will be held from 22-23 October 2009.

Focusing on Water

The DSD has substantial expertise in the area of water and climate change adaptation, where it has engendered new research, capacity building and technical assistance.

Latin America...

In Latin America and the Caribbean, the DSD is enabling a pilot group of countries to use technology as a means of integrating climate change adaptation and mitigation with their national sustainable development strategies. A main goal is to redress the impacts of climate change on ecosystems, water resources, agriculture, coastal zones, and human health. 

Africa...

In Africa, the DSD is implementing a project to help countries cope with water stress linked to poverty, land degradation, migration, and even conflict. With global warming expected to increase the variability rainfall, the DSD is building local expertise on integrated water management in African regions where insufficient infrastructure, population growth, and drought has left countries particularly vulnerable to water scarcity and the impacts of climate change. 

Commission on Sustainable Development

In the Commission on Sustainable Development, which addresses thematic clusters on a bi-annual basis, climate change has been a thematic focus as well as a re-occurring and important cross-cutting issue discussed in partnership fairs, side-events and learning center courses.

CSD-14 & CSD-15

At its Fourteenth session in 2006 and Fifteenth session in 2007, climate change was one of the main thematic issues under consideration along with energy, industrial development, and air pollution/atmosphere. 

CSD-16 &CSD-17

Climate Change was also a central cross cutting issue in the subsequent Sixteenth and Seventeenth sessions of the Commission, which focused on agriculture, drought, desertification, land management, rural development and African development.  The impacts of global warming on food security, an African green revolution and sustainable land and water management were included in ministerial round-table discussions leading up to the Chair’s Shared Vision and the negotiated outcome of the session.

Natural Resources Forum

The Natural Resources Forum (NRF), a UN Sustainable Development Journal issued by the DSD, has published substantially on the issue of climate change, with many articles available in the Virtual Issue on Climate Change.

NRF Virtual Issue on Climate Change

The virtual issue contains contributions on climate change from two issues of the Journal:

The Journal is also planning a Special Section on climate change to be included in its November 2009 Issue.