ISLAMABAD: A new report has called for the urgent need of increasing climate financing to help at-risk nations better prepare for future calamities.

The report released by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) on Thursday called for significantly scaling up adaptation this decade to address the impact of climate change.

It said these adaptation strategies are being hampered by the “huge gap” between the financial requirements and existing flows.

The report called upon nations to pledge their commitment to climate financing at the COP-29, opening in Baku on November 11.

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“Given the scale of the challenge, bridging the adaptation finance gap will also require innovative approaches to mobilise additional financial resources,” the report said, calling not only for more financing, but also a “strategic approach to investment”.

The UNEP report said international public adaptation financing to developing countries increased from $22 billion in 2021 to $28bn in 2022 which was the “largest absolute and relative” year-on-year increase since the Paris Agreement.

“This reflects progress towards the Glasgow Climate Pact, which urged developed nations to at least double adaptation finance to developing countries from circa $19 billion (2019 levels) by 2025.”

However, even achieving the Glasgow Climate Pact goal would only reduce the adaptation fin­ance gap — estimated at $187 to 359bn per year, by about 5 per cent.

The report also said that developing countries which are experiencing loss and damage due to climate change are “already struggling with increasing debt burdens.”

“Effective and adequate adaptation, incorporating fairness and equity, is thus more urgent than ever,” the document added.

The UNEP report called for a shift in adaptation financing from “short-term, project-based and reactive action” to anticipatory, strategic and transformational adaptation.

Published in Dawn, November 9th, 2024