High-Level Communiqué of the Climate Vulnerable Forum

Adopted Version

24 July 2023

We, Ambassadors and Senior Representatives of the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF) from Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Latin America, the Middle East, and the Paciﬁc, and forming a signiﬁcant number, and a representative group, of those countries most vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate change, meeting in-person and virtually, as convened from Accra, and in New York in July 2023.

Recalling the October 2022 Accra-Kinshasa Communiqué of the CVF,

Gravely concerned by the ﬁndings of the 6th Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), whereby accelerating warming of the planet is now estimated to reach 1.5°C by 2030,[1] and that global greenhouse gas emissions need to peak before 2025 at the latest, and be reduced by 43% by 2030 and 84% by 2040 versus current (2019) levels to prevent warming from surpassing 1.5°C, while impacts are set to expand alarmingly as temperatures rise with certain impacts, such as extreme heat spells, approximately doubling in frequency at 1.5°C versus 1°C.

Recalling the recent ﬁndings of the CVF “Traffic Light Assessment” (TLA) report, which indicates that the targets set out in most nations’ NDCs, particularly major emitting countries, are not sufficient to safeguard the 1.5°C goal, when taking into account fairness considerations, including equity, and which was submitted by the Ghana CVF Presidency as part of the Forum’s official contribution to the 2023 Paris Agreement Global Stocktake. As a result, the TLA report shows that not only is our atmospheric space being monopolised by the richer countries, but we are also not receiving sufficient and essential funding for adaptation and sustainable development, at a time when we are suffering from accelerating climate impacts from those who have long since exceeded their fair-share of the global carbon budget.

Recognizing the urgent needs of the most vulnerable countries for keeping 1.5°C – a survival limit – alive, reaﬃrming (1) the importance of delivery of international climate ﬁnance, (2) the transfer of technology, and capacity-building, which are crucial to enabling climate action by developing countries, and (3) the need to ensure adequate attention to loss and damage, including to put an end to the lacuna of international funding for victims of the impacts of climate change, as well as the urgency of accelerating adaptation including through stronger international climate ﬁnance.

Recalling the principles of the Convention and the Paris Agreement, including the principle of equity and common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in the light of different national circumstances, and their social and economic conditions and that the capacities of most vulnerable nations to respond to the climate crisis have been inhibited by the food and energy crises caused by the Ukraine and Russia conﬂict and the fallout and recovery to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Moving unitedly, do resolve as follows:

OUR KEY PRIORITIES FOR COP28

We urge UNFCCC COP28 in Dubai to respond decisively to our following key priorities:

1. Global Stocktake: We are alarmed that Parties have not made sufficient progress on their current climate pledges, and call on the major polluting nations to “course-correct” in order to safeguard the 1.5°C “survival limit”. Countries must use the outputs of the Global Stocktake to strengthen the implementation and scale up the ambition of their climate commitments and take immediate action. Each nation must contribute in accordance with its historical responsibility and capability.In particular, with the little time remaining before the temperature goal of the Paris Agreement will be broken, . COP28 must absolutely act on Global Stocktake and decide a course correction that requires major emitters and wealthier countries, who have the responsibility to do their fair share, to immediately (in 2023 and/or 2024) strengthen the ambition of their 2030 NDC mitigation targets to align with an equitable contribution to limiting warming to 1.5°C, and must increase support for climate change action by developing countries. We will support our leaders to issue a political declaration on an emergency fair-share response to the climate crisis, building on the Global Stocktake to be issued at the UN General Assembly Opening in September 2023.

2. Accelerated Adaptation Action. We reiterate the need for a standalone “Implementation Plan” to double international finance for adaptation by 2025 by developed countries and to provide transparency and accountability for progress. At COP28, we call again for a credible plan for realizing the doubling pledge on adaptation finance by 2025. We urge developed countries to urgently and significantly scale up their provision of climate finance for adaptation. Given that estimated annual adaptation needs are USD 160-340 billion by 2030, we need to at least triple adaptation finance in the near-term. We welcomed the standalone report on the agreed doubling of adaptation finance from 2019 levels by 2025, the adoption of a transformational approach to adaptive capacity, and clarity on the urgency of a clear framework for the Global Goal on Adaptation (GGA) with targets and indicators.We call for the full operationalization of the GGA ongoing Framework.

3. Loss and Damage: At COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh, the international community took a critical step forward by agreeing to establish funding arrangements for loss and damage, including a dedicated fund. We launched the “Payment Overdue” Loss and Damage Campaign in September 2022, generating more than 10 million online engagements and considerably raising the profile of social conversations on the issue of Loss and Damage, thus contributing to the creation of a Loss and Damage fund at COP27. While this represents a historic breakthrough in climate negotiations, countries must figure out the details of what these funding arrangements, as well as the new fund, will look like in practice. The lack of a commitment for rich and polluting nations to actually provide loss and damage funding remains a serious weakness. COP28 must ensure no “empty bank account” on the new UNFCCC Loss and Damage Fund. It is imperative for discussions on funding arrangements to move beyond statements of support, pledges and commitments towards facilitating and securing initial capital. The fund must be responsive, adequate, and at scale.

4. 1.5°C Ambition: The CMA3 Decision from COP26 recognizes that accelerated action is required in this critical decade “on the basis of the best available scientific knowledge and equity, reflecting common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities” and recalls that the Paris Agreement “will be implemented to reflect equity and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities”. The CMA4 Decision from COP27 expands on this decision in the context of “sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty”.

1.5°C is a survival limit for the most vulnerable – some CVF members stand to lose substantial or virtually all their national territory above this level of warming. In this context, we released the Traffic Light Assessment (TLA) report which reviews the current Paris Agreement 2030 mitigation targets in NDC for alignment with the fast-approaching 1.5°C limit to warming, in order to promote increased dialogue and understanding of equity considerations in climate action ambition. Contributing partners are commissioned to continue developing the TLA and communications on ambition and equity. The TLA report shows that major emitting nations, responsible for the overwhelming majority of global emissions, fail to account for past emissions, disparities in wealth and for the relatively higher prevailing per capita emissions, and do not represent a fair-share effort.

Thus, the major emitters must enhance their ambition in 2023 and make their utmost fair-share effort to reduce emissions during this critical decade by reviewing and strengthening their 2030 NDC targets in order to safeguard the 1.5°C limit. We call for the need for equitable burden-sharing and transparency based on equity parameters.

5. Finance: We welcome the V20’s Accra-Marrakech Agenda, which expects the rewiring of the global financial system to happen as soon as possible within the current decade, and, whereby, launching a roadmap following the V20 Ministerial Dialogue X in April 2023, the V20 will work throughout the year, culminating at the Marrakech IMF and World Bank Annual Meetings, to cement an international coalition behind a fit-for-climate global financial system.
In this context, we entreat the strengthening of the COP27 call on IFIs and MDBs to prioritise climate action in financing.

Climate finance effectiveness has far to go, beyond a Delivery Plan for the $100 billion of annual balanced climate finance, and too often the victims of climate change do not have access to financial resources. Access to climate finance should be streamlined and facilitated, particularly for vulnerable developing countries.

Delivery of climate finance in the New Collective Quantified Goal on Climate Finance (NCQG) should be needs based in terms of scale and volume, and responsive to the needs of most vulnerable developing countries, including by not increasing unsustainable levels of indebtedness and through a high and growing emphasis on grant-based funding for adaptation.

As the Green Climate Fund (GCF) enters its second replenishment, it must facilitate access and deployment of climate funds to climate vulnerable countries by providing large parts of its funding in the form of grants. This would send a powerful signal that developing nations are not being forgotten amidst competing and interrelated global crises.

FURTHER CLIMATE MEASURES

Climate action must happen beyond the UNFCCC to complement it and the Paris Agreement’s primary responsibility for arresting dangerous climate change, in which respect we particularly supported the following further key actions:

Adaptation: Promote full realization of the Africa Adaptation Acceleration Program (AAAP) and establishment of similar ambition adaptation programs in all vulnerable developing regions.
Climate Prosperity Plans: Maximum development and implementation of CVF/V20 national climate prosperity plans (CPPs) and mobilization of international financial and technical support towards their realization.
Culture: Expansion of the cultural program of the CVF into the domains of traditional communities, and the visual and entertainment arts.
CVF & V20 Joint Multi-Donor Fund: Strive for full capitalization of the CVF&V20 Joint Multi-Donor Fund, encouraging donor and member contribution strengthening.
Health: Promote the protection of public health from the impact of climate change, and understanding and leveraging of health co-benefits of climate change mitigation.
Human Rights: Protection and upholding of climate-threatened human rights through CPPs and the mandate of the UN Special Rapporteur for climate change and human rights (SRCC), and, in particular, advance the promotion of equitable responses to the climate crisis and delivery of the Paris Agreement using the full potential of international, legal and UN human rights bodies and instruments.
International Court of Justice on Climate obligations: Strengthening international legal frameworks that motivate and accelerate meaningful climate action and equitable responses to the climate crisis, including encouraging States to make submissions to the International Court of Justice on climate obligations.
Labour and Workforce: Protect workers and economic output from heat stress, leverage green jobs driven by the principles of social dialogue, social protection, rights at work, and employment and ensure a just transition.
Migration: Expand support to migrants and internally displaced persons affected by the impacts of climate change and leverage the contributions of migrants, diasporas, and their communities to climate action, including through the CVF Migrants4Climate Initiative.
Negotiations & Diplomacy: Enhance the negotiations capabilities of the CVF member States to further strengthen collaboration and cooperation to advance priorities in the UNFCCC and other relevant intergovernmental fora through diverse capacity-building programs.
Parliaments: Promote full realization of the Charter of the CVF Global Parliamentary Group (GPG), including through the holding of an “Accountability Summit” at UNFCCC COP28 and through legislative action plans for the implementation of national CPPs.
Renewable Energy: Strive for the full implementation of the CVF Vision 100% Renewable Energy target taking into account respective national geographies and circumstances and call on COP28 to adopt a global renewable energy target for 2030, together with financial support for developing countries to achieve this target. In particular, we are calling on COP28 to set an ambitious global energy access target to achieve universal access to electricity by 2030 powered by RE together with international financial support and technology especially for climate vulnerable nations. Global RE targets should also provide for robust international cooperation on just energy transition partnerships.
Security and Peace: Mobilization of the UN Security Council (UNSC) to address the threats of climate change and wider environmental crisis to global security, as well as addressing the links between environmental integrity, peace, and human well-being
Shipping: Further collaboration under the International Maritime Organization that contributes to an overall reduction in global emissions, including the comprehensive impact assessment of the basket of candidate mid-term measures needed to achieve a 1.5°C while mobilizing sufficient resources to ensure a just and equitable transition.
Youth: Empower youth voices through dedicated CVF capacity-building programs, training and fellowship (delegates to the UNFCCC and other key international events and initiatives).
Biodiversity: Integrating climate change, biodiversity, and risk management agendas constitutes the framework to reduce the present and potential effects of extreme weather and climate events while enhancing the possible benefits to reduce the vulnerability of biodiversity, ecosystem services, and the most vulnerable communities.

OUR INITIATIVES

As part of our efforts to promote and drive ambitious climate action and mobilize international support for climate-threatened nations, we will continue to pursue our own Climate Prosperity Plans (CPPs) with support from a wide range of partner international organizations. CVF members are those most at risk but efforts of our members are also part of the solution to the climate crisis. Develop a catalogue of solutions drawn from country experiences and the CPP development process and leverage the CPP program as a platform of South-South exchange on the sharing of solutions and best practices.

We have likewise relaunched the “Capacity-Building Fellowship” and “Youth Fellowship” in 2023. A collaboration of the CVF with the Global Center on Adaptation (GCA) and the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), the program aims to strengthen the capacity of fellows, as well as youth, and contribute to the development of national efforts to pursue the Forum’s strategic priorities on climate change in member countries and in international policy-making. We aim to expand our fellowship programs in future to encompass also our work in the International Maritime Organization (IMO).

We likewise look forward to the publication of the following CVF-commissioned research:

1. “Traﬃc Light Assessment” Report & Online Tool, an evaluation of updated NDCs and their compatibility with the 1.5°C goal, accounting for equity parameters, to be available in 2023 in the run-up to the conclusion of the Global Stocktake.

2. Climate Vulnerability Monitor, in its third edition and for the subsequent up-to-date maintenance of its online data platform, ensuring the most comprehensive possible global resource on the impact of the climate crisis.

We call on organisations, governments and individuals to support our 2023 online public campaign on equity which aims to urge for the updating of Nationally Determined Contributions, particularly by wealthy & high-polluting nations, and for finance delivery.

We support the Troika’s ongoing engagement on behalf of the Forum’s members in the V20 Joint Committee for multi-country ﬁnancing initiatives, in order to promote effective mobilization of ﬁnancial resources for CVF/V20 members’ climate action.

FORUM BUSINESS

We further elaborated on our own program of activities with the following steps:

1. Following the V20 Ministerial Dialogue X, decide to establish arrangements to facilitate the broad participation of members to be led by CVF representatives on the Troika-established Steering Committee for establishing an independent CVF/V20 secretariat. The CVF, meanwhile, reaffirms the existing ad hoc secretariat and support arrangement hosted with the Global Center on Adaptation.

2. Following the recent CVF presidencies of Marshall Islands, Bangladesh and Ghana, we agree that a CVF member from the Latin America and Caribbean region will assume the Presidency of the Forum after Ghana, starting in May 2024.

3. We expressed thanks to the CVF/V20 Secretariat team, hosted at the Global Center on Adaptation, for their support to the Forum.

4. We encouraged interested donors and members to consider strengthening the CVF & V20 Joint Multi-Donor Fund which ﬁnances the activities and priorities of the Forum through direct and indirect ﬁnancial contributions.

Developed in Accra on 13 July 2023 and adopted in New York on 24 July 2023.

Member States of the CVF*

Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Barbados, Benin, Bhutan, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Chad, Colombia, Comoros, Costa Rica, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Dominican Republic, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Fiji, The Gambia, Ghana, Grenada, Guatemala, Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Kenya, Kiribati, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Maldives, Marshall Islands, Mongolia, Morocco, Nepal, Nicaragua, Niger, Palau, Palestine**Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Rwanda, Saint Lucia, Samoa, Senegal, South Sudan, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Tanzania, Timor-Leste, Tunisia, Tuvalu, Uganda, Vanuatu, Viet Nam and Yemen.

*Prior to the adoption of the CVF Communiqué

**As a UN non-member observer state

Observer Governments and Partners: Dominica, Togo, COP28 Presidency, United Nations

[1] IPCC AR6 best estimate for scenarios SSP1-3 for the near term, 2021-2040.