Adaptation and the NDCs is an Insight Brief published by the NDC Partnership in October 2020. It focuses on how countries are integrating climate adaptation into their Nationally Determined Contributions by assessing risks, setting priorities, developing projects, mobilizing finance, and raising climate ambition.
Key insights:
The brief explains that adaptation has become a central part of climate action, especially as climate change increasingly threatens poverty reduction, public health, food security, water systems, and infrastructure.
It highlights that countries are laying the groundwork for adaptation by assessing climate risks, prioritizing actions, planning interventions, and tracking progress through monitoring and evaluation systems.
The brief presents three connected stages of adaptation action: planning, implementation, and ambition-raising, with capacity building, finance, and monitoring and evaluation as cross-cutting needs.
Many countries are seeking better climate data, information systems, vulnerability assessments, and risk analysis to help identify priority interventions and integrate them into national planning.
The brief stresses the need to move from planning to implementation by developing investable adaptation projects in areas such as food security, water management, nature-based solutions, resilient infrastructure, agriculture, disaster risk management, and health.
It notes that 15% of the analyzed adaptation requests were linked to financing and implementing adaptation projects, covering 78 projects from 18 countries.
A major priority is the identification, preparation, and development of bankable adaptation projects and project pipelines that can attract climate finance.
The brief also explains that around 50 countries submitted requests to strengthen adaptation in their updated NDCs, including by defining adaptation targets, broadening sectoral coverage, and improving data, monitoring, reporting, and verification systems.
Main message: Effective adaptation requires countries to move from planning to implementation through stronger data, better capacities, investable projects, wider sectoral coordination, and improved access to finance, so adaptation can be fully integrated into NDCs and national development plans.
