National Adaptation Plans

UNEP and GEF assist countries all over the world in their efforts to create National Adaptation Plans (NAPs). The NAP process seeks to identify medium- and long-term adaptation needs, informed by the latest climate science. Once major vulnerabilities to climate change have been identified, the NAP process develops strategies to address them.

UNEP’s focus is to strengthen capacities to generate medium- to long-term climate science evidence to inform NAP policy and planning, support the ministry responsible for climate change adaptation to engage in a consultative process with all key stakeholders different ministries, local governments, civil society partners, academia and private sector entities including chambers of commerce and similar economic groupings. Also, UNEP assists countries to better integrate NAP processes into their national development plans and budgeting.

The NAP approach was established under the Cancun Adaptation Framework (CAF) and re-emphasized in the Paris Agreement. Crucially, NAPs follow a continuous iterative process that is country-driven, participatory and transparent.

The two overarching objectives of NAPs are to:

• Reduce vulnerability to the impacts of climate change by building adaptive capacity and resilience.
• Integrate adaptation into new and existing policies and programmes, especially development strategies.

Countries can utilize the NAP process and its outcomes to update and improve the adaptation elements of the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), a central part of the Paris Agreement.

There are two avenues through which UNEP and GEF support the development of NAPs:

• The National Adaptation Plan Global Support Programme (NAP-GSP) – This project, funded by the Global Environment Facility, is run jointly with UNDP and provides support to over 45 countries. The NAP-GSP Programme identifies technical, institutional and financial needs to integrate climate change adaptation into medium and long-term national planning and financing and offers trainings and technical support to Least Developed Countries in their NAP processes.
  
• One-on-one country support programmes – these projects include one-on-one support provided to countries to advance their NAPs. UNEP is currently supporting GEF-funded NAP projects in Rwanda and Lao PDR and three non-country specific projects to advance national adaptation planning processes.

Pakistan: Launches a National Adaptation Plan for climate change

Pakistan has officially begun the process of creating a National Adaptation Plan for building resilience to climate change.

National Adaptation Plans are widely seen as one of the most important mechanisms for adapting to climate change. They aim to reduce vulnerabilities to climate impacts by creating comprehensive medium- and long-term plans, including the integration of adaptation measures into national policy. A two-year project to develop the adaptation plan was formally launched on Thursday 25th March at a virtual event attended by government ministries, academia, the private sector, and key members of Pakistan’s government.

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