Three steps COP should take for tangible outcomes

Every Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) now arrives with a slogan. Turkey has branded COP31 the “COP of the Future: The COP of Implementation”. Egypt promised an “implementation COP” at COP27, as did Brazil with COP30. A label claimed three times in five summits risks meaning nothing. Antalya should give it verifiable meaning: Report progress, show finance, and track voluntary targets.

Turkey and Australia had bid to host and preside over COP31, and settled on a division: Turkey hosts, holds the presidency and leads the non-negotiated Action Agenda, while Australia steers the negotiations.

But what does an “implementation” COP mean? Climate COPs remain negotiating forums on issues like mitigation, adaptation, and finance but the questions have changed since the Paris Agreement’s rules were adopted at COP24 and finalised at COP26. Negotiators once asked what needs to be done and who will do it; they now ask how it will be done and where we stand.

Presidencies increasingly lean on the action agenda to make the COP an implementation platform. Voluntary and consensus-free, it rallies non-state actors to climate pledges and gains traction faster than negotiated outcomes. The COP31 action agenda sets voluntary 2035 targets: Raising electricity to 35 per cent of final energy demand, halving global waste growth, and cutting energy-use intensity in buildings by at least 25 per cent. Traction, however, is not delivery: Analysis by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water finds that of 203 cooperative climate initiatives launched since 2015, only around 5 per cent have met their goals.

Under the UNFCCC, implementation means countries meeting the Paris Agreement’s obligations. The 2035 Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) were due in February 2025, yet COP31’s president is still urging countries to submit. The second biennial transparency reports are due by December 31. By late October, only Colombia and Turkey had filed. The summit meant to showcase implementation might close before much of the evidence arrives.

At its core, however, implementation means sharing progress against commitments. For developing countries, climate finance from developed countries matters most. They need money to both absorb unavoidable impacts and to cut preventable emissions. Without it, one may be paid for at the expense of the other. For small island developing states, least developed countries, and other vulnerable states, NDC implementation is the barometer for 1.5°C. Because this leads to the goal of mitigation, the Global North uses it to hold the Global South accountable for progress on their NDCs, which the latter reads as the former shifting scrutiny from their own NDCs.

COP31 will weigh the questions using UNFCCC secretariat reports, including on NDC Synthesis, BTR Synthesis, and the national adaptation plans progress. These feed forums such as the ministerial dialogue on climate finance and the Facilitative, Multilateral Consideration of Progress, where parties share progress, lessons and concerns. None enforces delivery.

Three steps could give the label substance. First, Turkey, having filed its BTR early, could press every party to submit on time and anchor Antalya’s discussions in the synthesis findings. Second, developed countries should file their biennial communications on climate finance, with figures on delivered and promised finance. Third, the presidency could commit to an annual public report on progress against its 2035 targets, giving voluntary pledges a scorecard. Its Climate Implementation Bridge, meant to turn national climate and adaptation priorities into investable projects, should meet the same yardstick. The success of a COP has to be measured by what the crisis demands. Showcasing implementation has become a signal of commitment and trust-building.

The writer is senior programme lead, Council on Energy, Environment and Water. Views are personal.