Adaptation costs for climate change are skyrocketing for everyone, especially in developing countries.
Costs are rising to $340 billion per year by 2030, reaching as much as $565 billion per year by 2050.
This is according to Simon Stiell, UN Climate Change Executive Secretary, at the opening plenary of week two of COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan.
Stiell said “it’s easy to become slightly anaesthetized by all these numbers, especially at this finance-focused COP. But let’s never allow ourselves to forget: These figures are the difference between safety and life-wrecking disasters for billions of people.”
The IPCCs Working Group Two report found almost half the human population live in climate vulnerable hotspots, where people are 15 times more likely to die from climate impacts.
Stiell also said adaptation investments, at the right scale and pace, can be truly transformative.
“We can no longer rely on small streams of finance.
We need torrents of funding. They need to be easier to access, especially for the most vulnerable countries that often face the biggest barriers.”
Stiell launched the NAP Expo (NAPs 3.0) initiative, this year, to promote innovative adaptation financing, tailored specifically to the needs of Least Developed Countries and Small Island Developing States.
He has urged philanthropies, the private sector, and bilateral donors to step up with the urgency that this crisis demands, without increasing the debt burden of vulnerable countries.