Climate Change

IUCN engages on this issue from multiple perspectives, from assessing the risks that climate change poses to biodiversity, to advancing practical nature-based solutions centred on the better conservation, management and restoration of the world’s ecosystems

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Impacts

> 80 %

of ecological processes that form the foundation for life on Earth are impacted by climate change

Solutions

37 %

of the mitigation needed between now and 2030 to meet the 2°C Paris goal can be provided by nature-based solutions

Communities

~ 25 %

of the world’s tropical forest carbon is managed by Indigenous Peoples and local communities

How we engage

IUCN assesses the impacts of climate change on species and ecosystems. Through its work on ecosystem-based mitigation, adaptation and disaster risk reduction, it also highlights the important role of nature-based solutions to climate change. It also works to ensure that climate policy and action are gender-responsive, socially inclusive and take into account to the needs of the most vulnerable.

Climate impacts
on nature

Nature-based solutions
to climate change

Inclusive
climate action

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Pantanal Conservation Area, Brazil Photo: Jose Sabino / Pixabay

In the spotlight:
Climate change now top threat to natural World Heritage

The IUCN World Heritage Outlook 3, published on 2 December 2020, reveals that climate change is now the biggest threat to natural World Heritage and affects a third of sites. The report assesses 63% of sites as either “good” or “good with some concerns”, while 30% are of “significant concern” and 7% are “critical”.

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Photo: © IUCN / University of Oxford

In the spotlight:
Strengthening nature-based solutions in national climate commitments

A report produced by IUCN and Oxford University presents an overview of the current level of ambition for nature within the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) of the Paris Agreement, and highlights what more can be done to harness the full potential of NbS in future NDCs.

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News

Sustainably managed mangroves can provide ecosystem services such as coastal protection, food and medicines as well as carbon storage, positively impacting both biodiversity and human well-being. The IUCN Global Standard for NbS provides a tool to help ensure that projects labelled as Nature-based Solutions - for example through restoration of mangroves - do indeed deliver the anticipated benefits to both society and biodiversity. Photo: Maxwell Ridgway / Unsplash

IUCN Standard to boost impact of nature-based solutions to global challenges
Great Barrier Reef, Australia Photo: Yanguang Lan on Unsplash

Four sites including Great Barrier Reef could become “World Heritage in danger”, while Selous may lose its status – IUCN advice
Photo: IUCN

What is high quality ecosystem restoration?