Harnessing Adaptation and SDG Synergies: Strengthening resilience and sustaining development progress
sdgs.un.org ·
Harnessing Adaptation and SDG Synergies: Strengthening resilience and sustaining development progress mavluda.aslova… Wed, 11/11/2026 - 23:16 Climate change is no longer a distant threat, and it is increasingly affecting progress on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Floods, droughts, storms and heatwaves are destroying homes, harvests and livelihoods and, in some places, reversing development gains. As many as 3.6 billion people live in places highly vulnerable to climate change impacts. Adaptation can limit these impacts, while sustainable development can reduce vulnerability, yet the two agendas are still largely planned, appraised and financed separately, at a time when adaptation finance remains well below need and development budgets are under strain. Developing countries’ adaptation needs are estimated at 12 to 14 times the international public adaptation finance they receive, and the financing gap to reach the SDGs is estimated at up to US$4 trillion per year. In 2023, UNDESA and the UNFCCC secretariat convened the independent Expert Group on Climate and SDG Synergy to examine how climate action and the SDGs can be advanced together. Through successive reports, it has become clear that breaking down silos and moving away from fragmented ways of working can deliver more impactful results from the resources allocated and drive the transformative changes needed. Building on this evidence base, the 2025 Global Report found that tackling climate and sustainable development together could reduce the public spending needed by some 40 per cent. Adaptation could not be included in that analysis because of limited data. This fourth global report fills that gap. Prepared by the Expert Group, which is now composed of 18 members and is co-led by Måns Nilsson of the Swedish Defence Research Agency and Shirin Malekpour of Monash University, the report was drafted with Elisabeth Gilmore of Carleton University serving as lead author on behalf of the group. It synthesizes 96 studies that value or measure what adaptation delivers and 189 evaluations of development programmes tested during real floods, droughts, heatwaves and storms. It is launched at COP31 in Antalya, Türkiye, as countries consider how to advance implementation of the Belém outcomes on adaptation and the second global stocktake under the Paris Agreement begins. It also comes ahead of preparations for the 2027 SDG Summit and the development agenda beyond 2030. Key messages 1. Adaptation can protect development progress, and where adaptation is insufficient or absent, losses cascade across the SDGs. Many of the appraisals reviewed found that the benefits of adaptation outweigh its costs, with most valuing those benefits at between one and six times the amount spent, and most of the studies reviewed quantify gains across more than one SDG, from food security and health to water and infrastructure. In Uganda, drought-triggered public works had benefits of about US$41 million against US$14 million in costs, and existing mangroves avert more than US$65 billion a year in property damage worldwide. Where adaptation falls short, losses cascade from incomes and assets to child nutrition and health, with effects lasting years. 2. Sustainable development protects people when it puts systems in place before a shock. Development systems already in place, such as social protection, insurance, savings, secure land rights and health services, are what limit losses when disaster strikes . Cash payments before Bangladesh’s 2020 floods more than doubled the share of families who evacuated, from 11 to 27 per cent, and insured herders in Mongolia held larger herds for one to three years after a severe winter. 3. The benefits an economic appraisal counts influence which adaptation options are funded and whom they protect. Some appraisals count only one type of benefit, such as avoided property damage, and counting wider benefits can change the investment case. In São Paulo, valuing the carbon it would store raised the implied benefit-cost ratio of modelled watershed restoration from about 1.2 to about 2.0. 4. Synergies depend on the adequacy, reach, timing and maintenance of development systems, and can weaken as shocks intensify. Cash shielded children’s diets in mildly dry conditions in Ethiopia but not in moderate or severe drought, and farm ponds in India protected crops in seasons with up to three drought weeks, but not in drier seasons. Deep and immediate emission cuts remain essential to keep risks within the limits of adaptation. 5. Strengthening adaptation and development finance together creates opportunities for synergistic investments that build climate resilience and sustain development progress. Debt is squeezing both agendas: developing-country public debt reached US$31 trillion in 2024, and 3.4 billion people live in countries that spend more on interest than on health or education. Adaptation plans, development budgets and climate funds can all help pay for the operation and maintenance of shared systems such as clinics, payment systems and land registries, each still assessed against its own purpose. 6. The road to 2030 is the window to strengthen synergies between adaptation and development processes, and the opportunity to inform the next steps. The second global stocktake under the Paris Agreement can assess adaptation by the development outcomes it protects, count social protection, land, financial and health systems as adaptive capacity, and judge adaptation finance by its timing and quality as well as its volume. The 2027 SDG Summit and the framework that follows 2030 can recognize development systems that support communities through climate shocks as having resilience value. Launch event | 13 November 2026, Antalya, Turkey at COP31 Recommendations Earlier Global Reports on Climate and SDG Synergy 2024 Global Report Read the full report here >> | Download the recommendations here >> | Read the web release here >> 2023 Global Report Read the full report here >> | Download key messages here >> | Download the map of case studies here >> /sites/default/files/styles/sdgs_news_big_thumbnail/public/2026-11/2026_un_synergy_solutions_covers_design_options.jpg?h=50887407&itok=76TfJaod 2026 1794571200 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 1 1 UN DESA and UN FCCC Climate Action and Synergies Related Goals 13 Tags harnessing climate sdgs synergies