[South Asia] – November 04, 2016 – The coming into force of the Paris Agreement, the most significant global treaty to combat climate change is an open acknowledgement by world governments that climate change is indeed the most urgent crisis facing the planet today.

At the 22nd Conference of Parties (COP22) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Marrakech next week, world governments must continue the collaborative process for laying the longer-term foundations for the new Paris regime by agreeing on a time bound work plan and fix rule books to ensure that countries embark on urgent action plans for ambitious emission cuts to set the world on the path of drastic emission reductions to put the 1.5°C limit into practice.

An important outcome expected from COP 22 is greater clarity on 
the $100 billion roadmap. The roadmap should demonstrate how a 50:50 balance between adaptation and mitigation finance is achieved. In absence of little or no means to adapt to the damaging impacts of climate change, the lives and livelihoods of the most vulnerable communities of the developing world – women, children, elderly, sick, disabled and the poorest of poor are being repeatedly destroyed by the incessant and unpredictable impacts of climate change.

“Adaptation finance is currently minuscule in comparison to overall climate finance flows. The high-level finance dialogue at COP 22 needs to provide tangible steps to identify an upward trajectory for adaptation finance until 2020, especially to assist women, children and poor people in combating climate impacts,” Said Sanjay Vashist, Director of Climate Action Network South Asia (CANSA).

CANSA members from the region are organising and co-hosting a series of side events during the COP22 at Marrakech including a workshop on “Strengthening transparency from finance to implementation” in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Brown University on 9th November 2016 and “Climate induced displacement – protecting and promoting rights of climate migrants in collaboration with Action Aid, Friends of the Earth and COAST from Bangladesh. CANSA will also continue to promote low carbon development and eco-village development concepts at the COP22 through various interventions.

Climate Action Network South Asia (CANSA) is a network of 150 organisations from the eight South Asian nations, organised exclusively for the purpose of fostering national and regional programmes that directly or indirectly contribute to addressing climate change in a manner which promotes equity and social justice between peoples, sustainable development of all communities, and protection of the global environment.