A massive funding shortfall for climate adaptation has created an "adaptation emergency" that puts the world's most vulnerable populations at ever-increasing risk, the U.N. Environment Program warns, as nations across the Caribbean struggle with catastrophic storms.
Speaking from U.N. headquarters in New York to launch the report, UNEP's Executive Director Inger Andersen told reporters: "Every nation is facing climate impacts, be they heat waves, wildfires, floods, or desertification. And right now, sadly, Jamaica is dealing with impacts of the strongest hurricane ever to hit this country as Hurricane Melissa continues its path towards Cuba with catastrophic flash floods being reported."
UNEP's annual report on Wednesday about the adaptation gap – the difference between how much funding is needed and what's available to adapt to climate change – warns that wealthy nations' failure to pay for resilience efforts could greatly harm public health and economic stability.
The report is subtitled "Running on Empty," a name Andersen stressed was "deliberately chosen" to highlight the fact that although nations are "gearing up" with plans, they lack the necessary funds to carry them out.
"Every fraction of a degree of reduced warming we achieve through mitigation will limit adaptation needs," the Nairobi-based agency finds.
"At the same time," it adds, "the current geopolitical tensions and cuts to overseas development assistance, among other factors, are making it increasingly difficult to mobilize the political will and resources necessary to address mitigation, adaptation, and loss and damage."
The amount of investment needed to protect developing nations is soaring.
UNEP calculates that the annual adaptation finance needs for these countries will exceed $310 billion a year by 2035 based on modeled costs, with needs extrapolated from national plans rising to $365 billion per year.
The projection, calculated in 2023 prices, continues a worrying trend. UNEP's adaptation gap report two years ago already noted that developing nations' needs were 10 to 18 times more than finance flows, with previous estimates of required funding reaching up to $366 billion a year.
The financial commitment from developed nations has stalled as delegates prepare for the U.N. climate summit, COP30, next month at Belém, Brazil.
International public adaptation finance flows to developing nations stood at only $26 billion in 2023, a slight decline from the preceding year. The disparity results in a current gap of $284 to $339 billion per year, meaning the required investment is between 12 to 14 times more than current flows.
As a result, a key international promise – the Glasgow Climate Pact goal of doubling international public adaptation finance to approximately US$40 billion by 2025 – will likely be broken.
"While the numbers for 2024 and 2025 are not yet available, one thing is clear: unless trends in adaptation financing do not turn around, which currently seems unlikely, the Glasgow Climate Pact goal will not be achieved," Andersen wrote in the report.
Addressing the lack of progress, she told reporters that nations will save money paying for climate adaptation now. "We need a global push to increase adaptation finance from both public and private sources," she said. "There may be many competing priorities. But the smart choice is to invest in adaptation now. It is, in a way, pay now or pay far more."
Mitigation failures and public health crisis
Insufficient global action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions drives up the cost of adaptation. UNEP reported last year that climate pledges put the world on a path to at least 2.6° Celsius of warming, potentially leading to a catastrophic 3° C. of warming under a "business as usual" scenario.
U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres delivered a strong warning, calling the latest adaptation report "a red alert" that climate impacts are accelerating but adaptation finance is not keeping pace, "leaving the world’s most vulnerable exposed to rising seas, deadly storms, and searing heat."
He stressed the need for the trillion-dollar initiative that was agreed on at last year's COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, and is set to be finalized at COP30 in Belém. It is a dedicated plan to mobilize at least $1.3 trillion a year by 2035 in total international climate finance — from both public and private sources — to support climate action in developing countries.
Guterres insisted this goal must include a fair share for adaptation and, crucially, that the new finance must not increase debt burdens.
"Developing countries’ adaptation needs are already more than twelve times greater than the finance they receive today. This is not just a funding gap, it is a failure of global solidarity," he said. "It is measured in flooded homes, failed harvests, derailed development — and lost lives."
The World Meteorological Organization and World Health Organization estimated 489,000 people died of heat in extreme weather events globally from 2000 to 2019, a figure 30 times higher than previously thought, and nations with inadequate early warning systems will likely suffer mortality rates eight times higher than those adequately monitoring climate data.
Debt traps and deficient planning
Compounding the crisis is the nature of the aid provided. UNEP's latest report finds debt instruments dominate overall adaptation finance flows, comprising 58% of the total on average between 2022 and 2023.
This reliance on non-concessional debt raises the risk of an ‘adaptation investment trap’ for vulnerable nations. A new goal to mobilize at least $300 billion per year by 2035 is insufficient, UNEP says, as inflation could push adaptation needs alone to $440-520 billion a year by 2035.
To address the debt risk, Henry Neufeldt, chief scientific editor of the UNEP report, emphasized that the Baku-to-Belém roadmap highlights "the need for grants, concessional loans, and other non debt creating instruments, which are crucial to avoid increasing indebtedness and making it harder for vulnerable countries to invest in adaptation."
Planning efforts are also considered to be weak. While some 172 nations now have at least one adaptation plan, 36 of those nations' planning instruments are outdated, increasing the risk of poor adaptation.
UNEP urgently calls for a systemic shift to deliver climate justice by calling on governments to raise climate aid by taxing the windfall profits of fossil fuel industries. The private sector is seen as a critical, untapped resource.
The report estimates the realistic potential for private investment in national public adaptation priorities at $50 billion a year, a ten-fold increase compared to current private flows. It calls on nations to prioritize grants and concessional, non-debt-creating instruments to prevent enhancing the vulnerabilities of developing nations.
When asked what types of programs need funding, Neufeldt cited examples of nature-based solutions for adaptation. "Smart irrigation systems powered by solar energy is another way of addressing this," he said. "And then of course, early warning systems, climate information systems are critical to removing lives and livelihoods out of harm's way."
This story has been updated with additional details from the press conference.
