4 June 2019: A report from the NAP Global Network outlines opportunities to improve alignment between countries’ Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and their national adaptation plans (NAPs). NDCs and NAPs are complementary processes, both representing elements of countries’ responses to climate change in line with the Paris Agreement. As of November 2018, 131 of the 183 submitted NDCs included adaptation information.

The report titled, ‘Adaptation Actions in NDC Partnership Plans: Opportunities for Alignment with NAP Processes,’ reviews 18 NDC Partnership Plans in order to identify adaptation actions, support for the actions identified, gaps in support, and ways in which development partners could help fill those gaps. The 18 countries whose Plans are reviewed in the report are: Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Honduras, Jordan, Kenya, Mali, Marshall Islands, Mongolia, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Pakistan, Rwanda, Saint Lucia, Sao Tome and Principe, Uganda and Viet Nam.

NDC Partnership Plans are multi-year plans that detail priority actions to guide implementation of mitigation, adaptation and cross-cutting initiatives to help achieve NDCs. They offer opportunities to increase NDC and NAP alignment by linking NDC pledges under the Paris Agreement with NAP processes that elaborate on how adaptation will be planned, implemented and monitored at the country level.

Adaptation actions are prominent in most NDC Partnership Plans, and many of the adaptation activities in the Plans address elements of the NAP process, including medium- and long-term adaptation planning, integrating adaptation in planning and budgeting, implementation of adaptation actions, and monitoring and evaluation (M&E).

NDC Partnership Plans also include actions that facilitate NAP processes, including capacity building, financing, institutional arrangements and information sharing, such as through South-South learning events. Other areas of potential support detailed in Partnership Plans include the development of sector or subnational adaptation plans and supporting the mainstreaming of adaptation in them. A few countries have also prioritized establishing or improving early warning systems and climate-proofing infrastructure.

The report outlines six priority activities related to the NAP process and identifies countries with either no support or gaps in support for such activities. The six activities are: policy, strategy and institutional framework; adaptation finance; adaptation M&E systems; capacity development; climate risk and vulnerability assessment, early warning systems and research; and adaptation project design and implementation.

The authors note that addressing these gaps could support NAP processes and enable countries to further progress towards achieving the adaptation components in their NDCs. [NDC Partnership News Story] [NAP Global Network Website] [Publication: Adaptation Actions in NDC Partnership Plans: Opportunities for Alignment with NAP Processes]