India's Minister of Environment, Forest & Climate Change, Bhupendra Yadav, participated in three crucial discussions at the COP30 climate negotiations, emphasizing the importance of adaptation finance and highlighting that adaptation is an essential investment, not just a supplementary option.
Yadav stressed that adaptation and mitigation are interconnected pillars of the Paris Agreement, citing India's experience to support this view. He emphasized the need for an increase in both the quantity and quality of adaptation finance, emphasizing the importance of grants over creating debt.
He also emphasized that assessing ambition should be based on genuine progress in community, ecosystem, and economic resilience, rather than complex new frameworks. It is vital for COP30 and upcoming COP31 to build trust, ensure implementation, and foster global collaboration to elevate adaptation ambition to the necessary level.
The minister highlighted India's proactive approach in prioritizing adaptation, integrating it into National and State Action Plans with increased domestic budget allocations. India has significantly increased adaptation-related spending, showing a 150% surge as a percentage of GDP from 2016-2017 to 2022-2023.
On the global stage, India has strengthened its capacity to access climate finance through readiness support and institutional capability enhancement. Yadav reiterated the need for predictable, increased, grant-based, and concessional funds to support adaptation efforts.
He expressed concern that the target set by the Glasgow Climate Pact to double international public adaptation finance to about USD 40 billion by 2025 may be unattainable if current trends persist. Achieving the financial levels outlined in the Baku to Belém Roadmap, totaling 1.3 trillion, requires a concerted global initiative. Yadav also highlighted significant obstacles, including delays in accessing multilateral climate funds, high transaction costs, and limited institutional capabilities.
The lack of reliable revenue channels and risk-sharing mechanisms hinders the mobilization of private financing. India advocates for adaptation efforts led by countries, responsive to gender needs, inclusive, and informed by scientific understanding and traditional knowledge.
Pilot projects support this approach, but many remain constrained by funding, technology, and capacity limitations. In addressing the ministerial-level roundtable on Just Transition, Yadav emphasized that a 'just transition' goes beyond an energy shift, encompassing a comprehensive, inclusive transformation of the economy.
This transformation must respect national contexts, promote equity, and ensure social justice, allowing all nations to engage fairly in global mitigation efforts. He emphasized that a just transition must enhance resilience and adaptive capacity, create jobs, safeguard livelihoods, eliminate poverty, ensure food security, and provide social safety nets.
Nations should have the autonomy to devise and implement their own sustainable development strategies aligned with their unique national priorities and circumstances.
India, along with other developing nations, supports the establishment of a Just Transition Mechanism, which is essential for acknowledging limitations and encouraging viable solutions. For countries in the Global South, it is crucial to access affordable and suitable finance, technology, and capacity building tailored to their specific national contexts, ensuring inclusivity for all. Yadav anticipates a meaningful outcome at Belém.
