Progress on addressing Loss and Damage
In 2013 the UNFCCC specifically addressed loss and damage associated with the adverse effects of climate change by establishing the Warsaw International Mechanism on Loss and Damage. The Paris Agreement that emerged from the 2015 UNFCCC Conference of the Parties strongly recognised loss and damage by making the Warsaw International Mechanism a permanent institution. The Agreement calls on Parties to recognise “the importance of averting, minimising and addressing loss and damage associated with the adverse effects of climate change, including extreme weather events and slow onset events, and the role of sustainable development in reducing the risk of loss and damage”.57
The Paris Agreement proposes several areas for international cooperation and facilitation to enhance understanding, action, and support including early warning systems; emergency preparedness; slow onset events; events that may involve irreversible and permanent loss and damage; comprehensive risk assessment and management; risk insurance facilities, climate risk pooling, and other insurance solutions; non- economic losses; and resilience of communities, livelihoods, and ecosystems.57
Increasing international efforts to support developing countries to avert, minimise, and address loss and damage including through the Warsaw International Mechanism will be important. The UNFCCC, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction provide a framework through which loss and damage can be addressed. Institutional and legal frameworks that are applicable at various scales will also be essential.
To implement comprehensive risk management strategies that reduce and avert loss and damage, decision makers will need a better understanding of the potential range, magnitude, and location of future climate change impacts. Enhancing understanding of the role of ecosystem services to human well-being is crucial to informing policy responses.
49
When ecosystems are not functioning at optimal standards, their provisioning capacity becomes unstable and their regulating of Earth systems can fail.58
Averting loss and
damage must include ways to safeguard ecosystems and their services that underpin human abilities to protect against loss and damage. The research community has a critical role to play in developing innovative tools and measures to address loss and damage. But the most important role is to deliver capacity to communities at the frontline of ecosystem destruction who need substantial investment and incentive to avert damage to and loss of ecosystems and their services. With the growing scientific knowledge on the residual impacts of climate change, it is imperative that societies anticipate loss and damage, and are prepared well enough to avert it.
Video: Interview with Saleemul Huq at COP 21 in Paris
© Acclimatise Video Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJI8F_6mGmY
UNEP FRONTIERS 2016 REPORT
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