Reflections from COP30 Belém

Bernadette Sexton

Day 1 of COP30 commenced with a heavy afternoon downpour. Belém, a city set in the Amazon rainforest, saw rain so intense that organisers soon had buckets scattered around the convention centre to catch leaks. If there is a god, the timing felt pointed. The UNEP Emissions Gap Report of 2025 estimates that global warming projections over this century, based on full implementation of Nationally Determined Contributions, are now 2.3-2.5°C. Under current policies alone, warming could reach around 2.8°C.

We are already living inside a world of intensified heatwaves, extreme rainfall, prolonged droughts, melting of ice sheets and glaciers, heating of the ocean, and rising sea levels. As temperatures increase, the effects will be most profound affecting those most vulnerable. Consecutive climate shocks displaced 2.2 million people in 2023 in Somalia, for example.

Throughout COP30, several Indigenous communities used their panels to sing, dance, and play music. Coupled with the rain falling outside, their presence drew the attention of attendees. It felt fitting, symbolic even, that these communities were finally having their voices centred. Yet the question remains: have they truly been listened to?

These communities are not simply cultural contributors to COP30. They are adaptation leaders whose knowledge systems have sustained ecosystems for centuries. These are communities who did not create the climate crisis, yet they will face some of its most extreme consequences: rising waters, prolonged droughts, and devastating floods. When rain finally does come after extended drought, the land is often too dry to absorb it, causing rapid flooding and further erosion of already fragile ecosystems.

COP30 made clear what frontline practitioners already know; adaptation is the first line of defence for human security. Adaptation is no longer a secondary concern to mitigation. It is foundational for stability, resilience, and human welfare as highlighted in the Returns on Resilience flagship report. For RedR, whose mission is to strengthen local capacity for crisis resilience, climate change intersects with humanitarian need in ways that are increasingly visible across our programmes globally.

In this context, what works?

National Adaptation Plans exist in most climate-vulnerable countries, yet the institutional capacity to implement them requires support. Finance ministries, local authorities, and civil society actors often lack the skills and systems to translate plans into action. This resonates with RedR’s recent work in partnership with the Government of Somalia, Global Centre for Adaptation, and the World Bank to strengthen public service delivery at the local level, improve access to climate-resilient urban infrastructure and services, and enhance readiness to respond to future crises and emergencies through targeted training programmes.

A defining takeaway from COP30 is that adaptation must be locally owned, inclusive, and equitable. Funders should align with country-led strategies and support community-driven approaches to avoid fragmented, top-down interventions. For over six years, RedR has worked with local organisations to strengthen climate resilience across countries including Philippines, Bangladesh, Uganda, Afghanistan, Kenya and Somalia, providing training, coaching, microgrants, and developing climate change adaptation and disaster risk resilience communities of practice. This equips participants with the tools to conduct climate risk assessments, implement adaptation strategies, and advocate for the inclusion of climate resilience within their organisations and communities. The demand is there. In our most recent cohort, 409 applications were received for 88 available positions.

Adaptation as systems strengthening

Adaptation must be systemic and cross-sectoral, bridging silos between agriculture, water, health, infrastructure, and ecosystems. Climate adaptation ultimately succeeds or fails on the strength of everyday systems: water, sanitation, health, transport; and the people who maintain them. This resonates at multiple levels. RedR’s humanitarian skills for engineers, a partnership with the Ugandan Institution of Professional Engineers and Makerere University, trained engineers to integrate humanitarian and climate resilience standards into national infrastructure systems. Our structural detailing and damage assessment work in response to earthquakes in Myanmar, Afghanistan, Türkiye, and Syria, is strengthening and has strengthened technical capacity for safer, climate-resilient reconstruction of critical infrastructure. Resilient infrastructure underpins health, water, sanitation, and protection systems, making engineering expertise a critical adaptation enabler.

Prioritise gender responsive planning

As I discussed on a panel with UNFPA, climate change is not gender neutral. Its direct and indirect effects, whether through slow-onset degradation like drought or rapid-onset disasters like earthquakes intensify pre-existing inequalities, undermine sexual and reproductive health outcomes, and dramatically increase the risks of gender-based violence due to disruption of health systems, reduced access to essential health care services, displacement, and harmful coping mechanisms. Meanwhile, climate change exacerbates structural inequalities, limiting women’s livelihoods, safety, agency, and participation in decision-making.  These risks reverberate across generations, undermining girls’ education, household income, and long-term economic stability. Integrating gender equity across adaptation, infrastructure and technical systems, preparedness, early action and disaster risk resilience, and workforce development is a high return investment.

This is reflected in RedR’s trainings on Gender Equitable Nutrition, Gender-based Violence and Protection from Sexual Exploitation and Abuse that has been rolled out across countries affected by conflict, displacement, and climate. It was also reflected in the work of RedR member, Annet Nsiimire’s project in the Rwamwanja Refugee Settlement which renovated cooking stoves, reducing the daily risk of violence and sexual abuse for women and girls who previously had to collect firewood.

Why this matters?

Adaptation is now central to humanitarian effectiveness, stability, and development. It is the backbone of resilience. Adaptation investments generate high returns, but only if countries and communities have the capacity, systems, and people to implement them. RedR occupies a niche at this intersection: bridging engineering and humanitarian systems, translating global adaptation priorities into practical local action, and building the human and institutional capabilities that enable adaptation to achieve real outcomes.

Investing in the people, systems, and skills that make adaptation real is one of the highest-return decisions governments and funders can make. It’s time to implement.