Climate change adaptation as a global public good: implications for financing

Beginning as an afterthought in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, adaptation as an agenda has come a long way since 1992. With no ambitious mitigation, recent years have witnessed an increasing frequency of extreme climate events, including cross-border or borderless climate risks. Accordingly, the Paris Agreement frames adaptation as a global goal and global responsibility. However, financing for adaptation continues to remain extremely poor, relative to the estimated needs, even though the regime has obligatory provisions for support by developed countries. Why is this so? Why should the majority of the countries, with an insignificant contribution to causing the problem, suffer from increasing climate impacts? How can adaptation finance be enhanced at scale? As a response to these…