The President-designate of the 2025 UN Climate Change Conference (UNFCCC COP 30) has released a second letter to parties, outlining his plans to orchestrate a global Mutirão around four fronts of action with a view to COP 30 and beyond. The letter follows a high-stakes virtual summit the President-designate co-convened with UN Secretary-General António Guterres in April to strengthen climate action and build momentum for the next round of nationally determined contributions (NDCs) due this year.
In his 8 May 2025 letter, COP 30 President-designate André Aranha Corrêa do Lago invites all to unite to: reinforce multilateralism and the climate change regime under the UNFCCC; connect the climate regime to people’s real lives; and accelerate the implementation of the Paris Agreement on climate change by stimulating action and structural adjustments.
According to the letter, the global Mutirão, which means coming together to work on a shared task and support one another, will focus on:
- a process of global mobilization;
- the Action Agenda;
- formal UNFCCC negotiations in June and November; and
- the Leaders’ Summit.
The letter reveals that the Presidency has already embarked on an experiment to trigger a new wave of global mobilization against climate change, “based on the proliferation of self-organized initiatives throughout the world.” The aim of this mobilization is “to build momentum around climate action and ambition, and to create the conditions for an inflection point in our climate fight” by unleashing “a self-reinforcing movement to mobilize humankind in its transition to the future, supported by a global framework capable of integrating local action.”
The letter highlights that instead of pledges to be fulfilled in the future, contributions to the global Mutirão “should translate into initiatives effectively delivered or that are ongoing or on the verge of being undertaken.”
To amplify the global mobilization against climate change, the letter notes, the incoming Presidency launched four visionary Circles of Leadership: the “Circle of COP Presidents”; the “Circle of Peoples”; the “Circle of Finance Ministers”; and the “Global Ethical Stocktake Circle.”
Looking ahead, the letter stresses that “the international community should investigate how climate cooperation could become better equipped to accelerate the implementation of the Paris Agreement and of COP decisions by aggregating efforts that are currently fragmented.”
Prior to these announcements, in a two-hour virtual session on 23 April, the President-Designate and the UN Secretary-General convened 17 national leaders from major economies and climate-vulnerable countries with a view to accelerating global climate ambition ahead of COP 30. The meeting, which was held behind closed doors, included China, the EU, the African Union (AU), the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), and small island developing States (SIDS).
During the meeting, Guterres said many leaders pledged to submit ambitious NDCs as soon as possible. Chinese President Xi Jinping confirmed that China’s updated NDCs would cover all economic sectors and all greenhouse gases (GHGs) – a clarification Guterres described as “extremely important” for climate action.
The meeting underscored the importance of collaboration and multilateralism in driving climate action. The UN Secretary-General also announced a high-level UN event in September to assess progress on NDCs and climate finance. [Host Country Website] [SDG Knowledge Hub Story on President-designate’s First Letter to Parties]