Keeping our climate promise

In the lead up to the 2019 UN Climate Action Summit, UNDP made a commitment to support at least 100 countries to improve the pledges that they made under the historic 2016 Paris Agreement. Our Climate Promise was made in recognition of findings that found nearly half of the world was planning to take steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but 71 countries were still undecided on the level of their commitment.

 

We set out to do everything we could, as 2020 represented the first opportunity for countries to formally revisit and enhance their pledges, which are called Nationally Determined Contributions or NDCs. Our goal was simple; we wanted to ensure that any country wishing to increase their climate ambition was able to do so. 

 

This commitment was rooted in our robust history of supporting countries to design and implement the first generation of NDCs, most notably through the NDC Support Programme, as well as our portfolio across energy, finance, governance, disaster risk reduction, health, nature-based solutions, adaptation and resilience, youth and gender. We were clear on what needed to be done. UNDP responded to countries quickly to define and deploy needed support.

 

Six months in, UNDP had formal agreements with 114 countries, making it the world’s largest offer of support on NDC enhancement.