MRI SLC member Mandira Shrestha and Executive Director Carolina Adler presented at the GEO Climate Policy and Finance workshop held 21-23 September 2021.
Climate policy and finance topics are new to the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) community. Therefore, GEO was pleased that hundreds of participants joined the Climate Policy and Finance workshop that was held over three days from the 21st to the 23rd of September 2021.
MRI SLC member Mandira Shrestha (ICIMOD) presented on the first day of the workshop, sharing an input on the “Perspective of mountain nations” in the Hindu Kush Himalayas region toward Earth Observation for climate action and disaster risk reduction. MRI Executive Director Carolina Adler presented on the second day, on Earth observations for collective ambition on climate, with a presentation titled “GEO Mountains: contributing to global climate impact assessments in mountain areas.”
This workshop provided GEO with a broad endorsement to further identify its contribution to climate action and its added value within the Earth observation community.
The workshop discussions highlighted that GEO Work Programme activities and GEO partners are enabling national climate adaptation, as well as mitigation, by providing actionable Earth observation data and information to governments.
The GEO community is also preparing to assess progress towards reaching the Paris Agreement’s long-term goals under the Global Stocktake process, through the application of Earth observations for aggregate assessments of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and global indicators on climate impacts.
Additionally, the workshop raised awareness of how Earth observations can strengthen the evidence base for public and private investment decisions on climate action. This is supported by an overview of ongoing initiatives by development banks, financial firms and insurance companies making use of Earth observations data and information for analysis and decision making.
During the event, GEO officially launched the GEO Climate Finance workstream, which will be implemented next year with more hands-on workshops and targeted engagements.
Workshop recordings and presentations are available at the links below:
GEO Climate Policy and Finance Workshop Outcomes Report
Day 1: EO for national climate action
Day 2: EO for collective ambition for climate
Day 3: EO for climate finance decisions
This blog post was provided by the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) Secretariat.
Image by Nasib Pandey.