 Okay, let's get started. Welcome everyone. I know there are people joining us and introducing themselves in the chat. I'm great to see so many people from different parts of the world. So good morning, afternoon, evening, or night, wherever you may be in the world. Delighted to welcome you to this IID debate. So looking ahead to 2024, what's in store for climate and nature, where we're also going to take a moment to reflect on COP at the end of last year, and we're particularly going to look at issues relevant to the least developed countries in this discussion. Just to say that we are recording this session, you have an opportunity to share questions throughout in the Q&A function below. Please do use that and we'll be taking time later in the event to channel questions to our fabulous panelists. And I just wanted to say at the start, for those of you who were hoping to join us in person in London, sincere apologies for the last minute changes. I think we were all taken by surprise by the extent of our rail strike in the UK today. So thank you for bearing with us in that late change of plans and really pleased you've been able to join us online. And a big thanks to everybody involved behind the scenes in organizing today's session. I really hope we do have a stimulating debate. So my name's Tom Mitchell. I'm the director of IID, and I'll be your host for the session today. And the way it will run is that we will have a set of prepared questions for our panelists. And then some quick follow ups and then plenty of time we hope at the end of the session for you to ask questions to the panelists too. And then I suppose just setting the scene for what we're going to talk about today. Well, we're going to reflect on why COP28 was so important. What happened there, what the implications are for particularly least developed countries. And then looking ahead to 2024, what can we expect and possibly even beyond to Brazil as well for it would be COP30 then in Brazil in 2025. And also remembering that 2024 is a year where we have a double COP. So we have COP16 in Colombia coming up in the second half of October. And then we have COP29 in Azerbaijan that is going to be in the middle of November this year. And then even before that, we've got so many important events, including the G20. We've got the Summit of the Future in New York in September. We've obviously got a huge number of elections through this year that will shape the tone. And particularly, I think the US election is one that obviously everybody's waiting to see the outcome with bated breath. And then the other thing I think, of course, that many people are beginning to turn their attention to is that one of the really big topics in 2024 is what are we going to do about climate finance? What is the new long-term goal on climate finance? And what does that mean in the context really of very challenging geopolitical relationships? I think the other thing I just wanted to note is that we continue to reflect on the life and extreme contribution that Salim al-Huk has made to this field, hugely valuable in the way in which he has shaped the international agenda, has put least developed countries at the center of that. And Salim really does stay close to our hearts. And certainly my personal reflection of being at COP28 is that we really had some lovely opportunities to have Salim's memory play a really important part in shaping the discussions that we had at COP28. And certainly on IID's part, we look forward to the launch of the Salim al-Huk scholarship and prize that will be in April that will be dedicated to supporting early career researchers from least developed countries and small island developing states, particularly those bringing forward research on loss and damage. So that's going to certainly be a key feature of what we do at IID this year. So let me just introduce you then to the panelists before I pass over to them directly. I'm delighted to have Madeline Dufsa here, who was the chair of the least developed countries group right up until the end of COP in December 2023. Madeline still stays on, of course, as the head of climate change division in Senegal's ministry of the environment, sustainable development, ecological transition. And we're also welcoming Professor Jim Ski, the chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and newly with and hosted by IID. So delighted to have you, Jim. To Yamakani Idris, who is part of the Malawi and leadership that takes up the mantle of the least developed countries chair as it passed from Senegal to Malawi. Yamakani has been a long standing partner of IIDs and is an environmental officer in the Ministry of Natural Resources and to our own Nicola Soresby, researcher in IIDs Natural Resources and Climate Change Research Groups. So welcome to you as panelists and I would encourage you as panelists if you can to have your cameras on if at all possible, if the bandwidth allows, but equally we understand that people are coming in from different parts of the world and that sometimes can be challenging. But Madeline, maybe first I can turn to you. How did you experience kind of COP 28 outcomes and what did you think, what did you get from the LDC Groups perspective and how would you look at the year ahead? Over to you. Thank you Tom. I have put my camera on but I don't know if you can see me. We can see you well Madeline. We can see you very well. Okay, great. Good. So thank you for IID for inviting us to this important discussion looking ahead at COP 24, coming from COP 28. And also give me this opportunity to really thank also all LDC countries for giving me this opportunity to chair the LDC Group last year and the last year before from COP 27 to COP 28. And I think it's really a big opportunity for LDC countries during these two years to work ahead of some high important topic who are really important for us. It's the issue of lost and damaged. It's the issue of the global golden adaptation and also the issue of how to keep online the 1.5 degrees Celsius has been recommended by the IPCCC. So COP 27 and COP 28, in particular COP 28, allow us to be able really under the leadership of COP 28 Presidency. UNA I think we know to recognize that we were being able to finalize the decision around the lost and damaged fund. And it was really something that was been really welcomed by all parties, particularly the most vulnerable countries. Another element also is to ensure that this fund is also been receiving some resources. So we have been able to have preliminary resources from partners. This is really also something we need to welcome. We're looking for having more because the demand for lost and damaged is important, particularly for these developing countries for small islands state. And the fact is we are a victim of climate change. So saying that having this great starting of this COP 28 is something we need to really address and also to underscore this leadership of UNA Presidency. We also been able to discuss around the global Golan adaptation is a key for LDC. We are not being able maybe to have clarity regarding how we will finance this global Golan adaptation. But we expect it will come in this year. We will continue discussing on the finance around the adaptation, who is also really important for LDCs. As LDCs adaptation is key, we need to adapt. We are already facing the high cost of adaptation, of high cost of constant purchase from climate change. We are suffering with many other from climate change. And I know that the IPCC chair here with us will really come on IPCC recommendation. So saying that we are really looking for having more clarity regarding finance around adaptation. And as I say, we underscore this decision to continue working on the global goal on adaptation, starting with all being agreed around some global decision around adaptation, like the planning aspect of adaptation, ensuring that all LDCs will be having a national adaptation plan elaborate, looking for the implementation of NAPS. This is the key also. And I hope from this decision, we will see more support to help LDCs to implement, to develop their NAPS and knowing that all not know LDC will be behind regarding the planning of NAPS. We have been able also doing this COP28 to discuss around how to achieve a 1.5 degree by 2050. It was really a difficult discussion, but we need to recognize that we have been able to really bring the issue of how we will treat in the coming year the issue of fossil fuel. It's important to be also aware that we have been doing COP28 with the mobilization of all the society, all stakeholders, non-state actors to decide that we need to really move from fossil fuel to clean energy. And the decision through the global stock take was also an opportunity to make this high recommendation to all countries, to all parties, to all actors, that they need to revise our way of dealing with fossil fuel. And some key global objective was being also coming from the decision on the global stock take easily to have a global objective on renewable energy, to have also opportunities really to integrate work around deforestation, how to move to support deforestation, that is also something that is really important for LDCs. Many LDCs countries are also concerned by biomass energy and having the support around how to limit deforestation in all countries and having support for us for LDCs is also an opportunity to take on board. I want also to insist on the NDC implementation. We are looking for having our NDC to be implemented. We have NDC since 2020 and the issue of how to implement these NDCs is key in particular for LDCs. So also the decision to have some support and to recommend more support for LDCs countries regarding the NDC implementation is something also we need to highlight here. So we're really looking to work more this year around the global goal on adaptation, how to work on indicators, how to really ensure that support is made and is available for countries regarding around the adaptation pillar, but also how to start discussing also the new goal on finance. So this was also an aspect that we were being not able to conclude as this year we will have to discuss on the new collective goal around finance. So this is something maybe I want also to bring on the table and I will stop there looking for more. Thank you very much Madeline. Very good to get your perspectives on the whole range of topics that are important to LDCs coming out of COP28. And I suppose with that we should pass to Yamakani and particularly to look at the results of the global stock take and its kind of implications for least developed countries. But actually in advance of this session we were also taking questions and inputs from from different participants. And so Yamakani I wonder whether you could also respond to a question from Ian Mares from the UK Government Department, DEFRA, which looks at how can we use the evidence from extreme weather events and accelerated extreme weather events and how can we think about how least developed countries can tackle those particularly relying on support and engagement of private finance and the finance sector. So you've got a big challenge there Yamakani. So to look at the goal, look at the outcomes of the global stock take for least developed countries, but also reflect on what the impacts of extreme weather events mean for finance mobilisation. Can you hear us okay Yamakani? You're on mute if that's making a difference. There we go. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you. All right. Thank you. First of all, let me appreciate IID for inviting me to be part of this conversation. As I've mentioned, I've been part of the IID throughout my work in this area. So I do appreciate to join you also to look at what 2024 brings as far as the climate and nature is concerned. So from stock take, I think there was an opportunity for the least developed countries, especially this being the first one since we agreed in Paris about the goal which we are all looking forward to. So as you understand, for the LDCs, the only hope we have is to achieve the Paris Agreement goal because it's the one which brings us together to really tackle the climate change head on. So the global stock take was there to really try to assess the progress we have been making as far as implementing the Paris Agreement is concerned. And the two years has been so intense. We had inputs from all over the world, stakeholders from the non-government side, the private sector, and everyone was involved in this rigorous work and that was very massive. And we should really approach that approach where we have all stakeholders being involved in making decisions. So first of all, the global stock take identified the gaps both under mitigation. We are not doing well as far as reaching the 1.5 degrees percent in line with the science. And we are not doing well in adaptation as well because most of our countries, especially the least good countries were still suffering from extreme weather events. As we are speaking now, a lot of LDCs are in the mess being affected by floods, droughts, and so on, which is very catastrophic. So we are not doing well in adaptation and misuse beauty. And we are not doing well actually in finance in the means of implementation. As you understand, until now, the hundred billion which was promised hasn't been fulfilled. And many other praises which were made on finance and misrepresentation were not. And this was highlighted within the decision of the global stock take. And that was very important because we really, first of all, needed to acknowledge that we are not doing well. And that's good for us, the LDCs, because we are being affected and we are not being supported enough. And then what was also key in the global stock take is the way forward. So as mentioned by the former chair Madeline, there were quite concrete resolutions from the global stock take to support us to move forward. For instance, she mentioned the mitigation about the transitioning away from fossil fuels. So that was a massive decision. And we also saw decisions to do with doubling of adaptation finance within the global stock take. And also saw the decision on how to strengthen the technology development and transfer as well as the capacity building within the LDCs. And that made the global stock take decision to be fair for us as LDCs because some of the issues we are really addressed as far as the way forward is concerned. So what would be key in 2024 now is to look at how best do we put in practice the decision we made at COP28 under the first global stock take. And that includes the wake on enhancing ambition in revising our NDCs. And there are NDCs should be informed by the decision of made under the global stock take. So in a nutshell, the global stock take was very I was very considering the LDCs. So our issues were taken on board. And we really liked the way that the stakeholders participated. And we had a lot of good resolution there, including the cross cutting issues on how we consider gender, the migration and so on the human life. So there are quite a lot of good outcomes which we are within the global stock take decision. So I stop there for now. Thank you. Yeah, Mekani. Thank you very much. Very kind of rapid and comprehensive overview. I really appreciate that. Nicola, maybe I can turn to you now. We're going to pick up also, of course, it's not just climate change that we're covering here, but we're also looking at the nature dimensions too. And I wonder whether you could just help us to connect partly what happened at COP28 as well when it comes to nature and to food and so on. And equally, then how do we look forward to COP16 later in the year? You're working on these issues. Give us some insights. Thank you, Tom. Thanks for the introduction. And hello to everyone joining us today. Great to see so many people here. Thank you to the other panelists for the comments so far. I'm going to build on those a little bit. I'm going to slightly switch direction and talk a little bit about how the COP28 outcomes are relevant for nature and biodiversity. And then also elaborate a little bit on the climate finance commitments that we're expecting to see later this year in 2024. So starting then on kind of nature outcomes and links to the biodiversity COP, I think possibly the most important thing to say first is that COP28 was actually the first climate COP that we had since the agreement of the Global Biodiversity Framework, which of course happened at CBD COP one year previously in Montreal. The Global Biodiversity Framework was a landmark agreement for protecting nature over the next 10 years and this has been likened to the Paris Agreement in the climate space. So certainly with this in place, there were high expectations that with the GBF in the CBD, this would help to put nature on the agenda within the UNF Tripesee climate negotiations and help to hopefully begin to align the two quite separate policy processes. And we did start to seize the progress on this at COP28. One significant development, which came at the end of the conference, was that the UAE COP presidency put out a joint statement with the CBD presidency on climate nature and people. And the kind of force behind the message of this was really pushing for a shared effort to address both climate and biodiversity together and stressing that this is actually the only way that we can achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement, all the goals of the Global Biodiversity Framework. This was really significant. We also saw some positive deaths forward in the Global Stocktake, which included a reference to the GBF and stressed the urgency for united action on both nature and climate. And there was a target on nature and biodiversity included in the Global Goal and Adaptation. So quite a few signs pointing towards a much stronger consensus that climate and nature should be addressed together rather than separate issues and also actually that the climate and biodiversity cops should be aligned more to one another. So also linked to this, we had the Food Sustainability Declaration at COP28. This came in the first few days, I think. And this was really a significant agreement since it was the first time that the link could be made at the COP between food systems and climate. And it's the first time that countries will be obligated to report on their emissions from food and agriculture as part of their NDCs. Food systems, of course, really sit at this juncture of nature, climate and people. Obviously, we need healthy food systems to survive and food systems depend on a healthy climate and thriving nature. So it's really essential in this area that we find a sustainable solution. The focus now, of course, is on turning this declaration into more meaningful action for change with food systems. So, for example, we're hoping to see increasing financial commitment to supporting small-holder farmers and small-holder producers. We know that they already spend billions of dollars on their own money adapting to climate change and protecting nature. And we're also hoping to see kind of more support going towards initiatives that support agri-biodiversity instead of large-scale monocultures, which are high-polluting and, of course, destroy nature as well. And then turning to look at climate finance. So, some of the other panelists already touched on this, but we are expecting a draft decision text at the head of COP 29 on the new Long-Term Climate Finance Goal, otherwise known as the New Collective Quantified Goal, or the MCQG. This, of course, builds on previous goal, which was agreed back in 2009, almost 15 years ago now, that richer countries would provide $100 billion per year to developing countries to address climate change. And as we've already heard, it's not taken actually as knowledge that this goal has not reached in 2021, and so this is expected to be a really major focus of the coming year. There's lots of questions we need to see answered around the new climate finance goals, such as, for example, how much will it be for, but also where will that money come from? How is it going to be delivered? How will we measure progress against that goal to know if we've actually achieved it this time or not? What we would really like to see from this goal is a real emphasis on the quality of the finance as well. So, for example, will it be delivered in a way which ensures it really reaches local actors instead of getting stopped in the hands of financial intermediaries and so forth? And, of course, we need to be an increased commitment specifically to adaptation. So, back at Glasgow, there was a commitment made to double adaptation finance by 2025, so looking at how the new MCQG will respond to that and really help enable us to reach that goal as well is really important. And finally, we saw new pledges made at COP 28 to the funders such as the adaptation fund and the Green Climate Fund and also several funders opening funding windows which focus on locally led adaptation or LLA. So, this is obviously all very positive, but we do now need to make sure that these commitments are followed through with action and we need to see real evidence of changes to funding delivery mechanisms which can help enable locally led adaptation instead of just having empty commitments around LLA. So, yeah, quite a lot to look forward to this year. I'll leave it there. Back to you, Tom. Brilliant. Thank you, Nicola. I think if you're one of those people who are, I suppose, new or uninitiated in the international architecture of tackling climate change and nature, you have a steep learning curve when it comes to acronyms and topics. And I think NCQG is a new one for us to battle and probably the least elegant of all of the acronyms that we have to deal with. But undoubtedly, it's going to be a lot of discussion this year, of course. Yeah. Jim, let me turn to you, last but not least, in terms of our panellists and just ask you to reflect on COP 28, I suppose, towards the double cops this year on what are the kind of implications for the IPCC? What do you take away from those from the session in Dubai? Yeah, okay. Thanks, Tom. And can I just say how delighted I am to be participating in my first public meeting as an employee of IED? Let's just say that, first of all. And just to say, you might be surprised how little attention as IPCC people we pay to the negotiations when we go to a COP. It's all bilateral side events, interviews. Where we do tend to pay attention is where the decisions come about, where they mention IPCC. And in particular, where they invite IPCC to take particular action. So that's where I will go to almost straight away. Lots of mentions of the IPCC sixth assessment, which we're very flattered by. But I think there are three relevant invitations in the decision documents that I think are worthwhile flagging up. And the first one was in the global stocktake decision, inviting IPCC to consider how best to align its work with the second and subsequent global stocktakes and also to provide relevant and timely information for the next stocktake or come on to how IPCC is responded to that one. The second two invitations I want to pick up are all about adaptation, which is a strong theme here. One of the invitations isn't IPCC directly, it's through the subsidiary bodies to provide information relevant to the implementation of the global goal on adaptation, including in relation to targets, indicators, metrics, methodologies, etc. And there is a specific mention there of collaboration with IPCC in achieving that objective. So that's something we've got on our agenda. And the third invitation, which actually goes back to the Charmel Shake in COP 27, is inviting IPCC to update its 1994 technical guidelines for assessing climate change impacts and adaptations. So I think that's what these were three important invitations effectively that IPCC needs to consider. Now, IPCC had the first plenary of the new cycle in Istanbul two weeks ago. And it was a very fraught and difficult session in classic IPCC style, finishing 16 hours late at 10 o'clock on a Saturday morning. So there's all emblazoned in our memories. But just to summarise what IPCC decided, including how to respond to these invitations, it confirmed that there will be a special report on climate change in cities, and working on that is already underway. It confirmed that there will be three working group reports as usual, plus a synthesis report. It confirmed that there will be that there's a bit of IPCC that everybody forgets the task force on inventories, which is actually incredibly important. And it's going to be to doing two methodology reports on short-lived climate forcers, but also on carbon dioxide removal technologies and carbon capture and storage, which has not been looked at for more than 20 years in IPCC, so it's well overdue. And there was a decision, indeed, to update these 1994 guidelines on adaptation. And if I might just say on that, I must be the few people left who can remember it. I looked back to these 1994 guidelines and I discovered I was one of the experts that helped produce them. I had to say it slipped my memory, but I was reminded that I'd actually done that. So we will be working on that. But one thing to say is that on these guidelines, procedurally, they're going to be done as part of the working group two report. So the scoping, the selection of authors, the lead authors' meetings and the approval will all be part of the working group two report, but it will be produced as a distinct product, which is identifiable, which I think was important to a lot of developing countries. So that's where we are. And just to flag up, I think this is going to be a strongly adaptation cycle for IPCC. There's going to be a lot of attention to it. And there's a lot of a burden actually on working group two on impacts adaptation and vulnerability, where I'm sincerely hoping, Tom, that IID can provide a little help, because there's obviously so much expertise within the IID system. Maybe just to finish off, I can talk a little bit in follow-ups about what the plans are for this year. But one thing to flag up is the links between the triple climate crisis of climate biodiversity and pollution. And this is something that's got quite a lot of attention. I met with David Abura, the new chair of IPVS, while in Dubai. And we will both be going to the UN Environment Assembly at the end of next month, where there will be a side event on the scientific links between the different assessments and how they can help to work together with each other. And just to say, I don't think it is particularly helpful to try and think about how we all change our procedures in order to collaborate. David and I are agreed that the best route forward is what you might call soft collaboration within our existing mandates, where we look at issues like glossaries, coordinated scenarios, shared workshops, these kinds of issues. Because there are actually many obstacles to us, using, there are big differences in the way IPCC is working groups, if best does not. There are also different approaches to the use of private and philanthropic funding. That would be really quite difficult. So we can think of softer ways of moving forward. And just finally to say, IPCC did have a lot of links and conversations with the COP28 presidency. And in Dubai, we had already started conversations with Azerbaijan and the COP29 presidency. And they are very much saying they intend that their COP will be a science-based COP. As there are only 20,000 hotel beds in Baku, it's going to be a much smaller COP than the one in Dubai. So a little more focus may be there as well. And I'll finish there. Thank you, Jim. Let's wait until see whether there's cruise ships come into the port and so on. Let's, I'm sure a lot of logistics and planning to go on before Baku. But thank you very much, very clear kind of summary of the expectations for the IPCC. So we've had a lot of questions, both in the chat window and in the Q&A below. Please do add questions to the Q&A. If you see there is also an opportunity to upvote different questions by clicking on the little thumbs up, it will help us just be able to prioritise which questions get posed to the panellists. And I would also encourage the panellists, if you see something there that you can answer quickly or you want to jump in and use your spare time, then please do so. You have the opportunity to provide some written answers, but we'll do our best to get through as many questions as possible. But maybe I can turn back to the panellists just very, very briefly for a sound bite. I think very much about what you're looking forward to in 2024, what your expectations are. Nicola, maybe I can start with you. We'll just change the order a little bit. What's your sense? Are you hopeful? Is there something in 2024 you're particularly looking for as a signal for progress? Yeah, thanks, Tom. I definitely say there's cause for hope this year. So a couple of things just to mention, I guess you already touched on it earlier, but this year we have another double cop year. So cop 29 of course is going to come I think even less than a month after we have CBD cop in cop 16 that is in October. So certainly we're expecting dialogue around nature and alignment with development in the CBD to be high at cop 29. And of course you also mentioned earlier we're already seeing momentum building around cop 30 in Brazil, which of course will be the following year in 2025. This cop is going to take place in Belém, which is an Amazon city in Brazil. And this does appear to be kind of a deliberate effort from the Brazilian cop presidency to really bring nature into the climate conversation by physically bringing the climate cop to one of the world's largest rainforests. So this is already also gearing up to be a major moment for nature in 2025. So the next two years actually I think we're expecting to see kind of strong action on both nature and climate and really weaving together these two narratives. And there's a strong message emerging of course that climate and nature crises should be addressed not a separate thing but actually together as one. And then in relation to finance I think we're hoping to see definitely an ambitious new goal for climate finance which meets the needs of developing countries and delivers on adaptation. Whether this will happen, of course we still don't know, we don't know what the outcomes of some of these elections will be which may influence this. But we're certainly hopeful at this stage. We would like to also see accountability from some major funders and finance providers to deliver quality finance which can be accessed quickly and easily by local actors instead of kind of just false commitments around locally led initiatives. And finally I'll just say it'd be nice to see a long-term climate finance goal which acknowledges that finance must deliver actually positive outcomes for both climate and nature if it's going to have meaningful impact and which align to the finance targets which we already have in the global biodiversity framework. The kind of a line in both of those things will be I think a really significant development. And you know there's hope that this could still happen this year. There's plenty going on to look forward to. Thank you Nicola. Yamakani let me turn to you. Are you hopeful for 2024? And if so why? You're on mute. There we go. Yeah thank you very much for that question. Yes so I'm hopeful for 2024. Yeah we are considering the tremendous achievement we made at COP28. I think it sets a different pace in the climate change regime. Especially one looking at what happened with Los Andales which had been a decision made even during the early days of the COP. So it sets a different pace that we really could be acting as speakers we can so that the the time so let's look inside. So I believe that we will then maintain that momentum from COP28 in 2023 to 2024. And as you can see so that's been highlighted by the previous speaker. COP30 is in Brazil and we've seen already the Brazilian are being very active to try to also set their own ambitions as far as their hope is possible. So I'm so hopeful that in COP29 this year we're going to maintain the momentum and indeed have great achievements. But more importantly this will be the first year after the first GrubStop day. So we expect parties to start putting into practice or implementing indeed the outcomes of the first GrubStop. As I mentioned one of the key outcomes is that the next NDCs which are due next year in 2025 they are supposed to take on board the decision we have made at COP29. So already it means the parties as they are formulating their 2025 NDC they should be referencing what we have agreed at COP29. As well as the other thematic areas like the new collective confide goal on climate finance it's that the negotiations which will continue this year they have to consider the outcomes of the first GST. The global go on adaptation as well. So all the negotiations now will be centered on how we bring on board what we have agreed at COP29 and COP28 under the GrubStop thing. So I'm so hopeful and looking forward to engage in this year so that we are not backsliding. We are little moving forward with addressing the gaps and challenges which we have identified through the implementation of the parties agreement. Thank you. Yama Khani if I could just hold you there for one moment I'm going to start addressing some of the questions that we've been getting and I think there's one that we should pose to you which is if you were in charge of setting the new quantified target for climate finance what level would you set it at? Yeah thank you in terms of the actual amounts. Yeah so the amounts needed quite a lot. So what I could do to really have the figure to set up that goes through what the needs of the developing countries as far as the NDC are concerned. So we have identified our needs. For example for Malawi we need around 50.2 million U.S. dollars billion U.S. dollars to implement our NDC. So I could really look at that especially for the most vulnerable countries like the LDC and SIDS to look at their needs and what are their financial requirements for them to achieve their NDCs as well as to build their adaptation and the mysterious in their country. So that could be a way forward for me to identify the actual figures to set up the new collective and quantified go on climate finance. Thank you Yamakani. Thank you. Jim I'm not going to ask you the same question and you'll be relieved to know but what I might do is combine that sense of if you were talking about COP 29 and Azerbaijan being a science COP I'd like to press you a little bit more on what that might mean in practice. And then also there's a couple of questions here that I might address to you. One is for AR7 do you expect to see culture and heritage be included within the AR7 cycle and equally is there any chance of a special report coming up or at least chapters related to climate change and child rights as a question posed here if you could address those. Yeah just to start from the back end first there will be no other special reports other than cities in the cycle that is a firm decision that governments take so any other topics will be need to be scoped into the standard working group reports in order to get them covered and there will probably be a scoping meeting before the end of this year and that that is the point at which it would actually come in. I know you weren't going to ask me about finance but could I could I just come back on it briefly. I mean we've heard that the number quite a lot in terms of the quantitative amount is very clear that what the real needs are in the trillion's level. That is what we would have to have to be speaking about and IPCC would covered finance quite comprehensively in its working group three report on mitigation but there's a lot more work needing to be done on adaptation in the next cycle and one of the ambitions of myself and the working group co-chairs is to have much more linkage between the working groups so perhaps finance could be dealt with in a more comprehensive way rather than divided artificially into adaptation and mitigation when we go into the next cycle. And a science based COP29 that is a discussion we would need to explore with the Azerbaijani presidency to understand there. I mean there was an awful lot of reference and reliance on IPCC in the decision documents at COP28 and that is the same signal that we are getting from the COP29 presidency at the moment as well. It's to be explored. And Jim maybe if you could stay on for just a second. I think there's a couple of other questions here related to the IPCC. I think one is from a colleague Megan Rowling you referred to the recent meeting in Istanbul as fraught. Can you just elaborate maybe a little bit on that? I think particularly from the perspective of why do you think that that was so fraught. Yeah go with that one for now. Yeah sure I mean the the issue is that we have decided the government's decided what reports to produce in the next cycle but they did not decide when they are going to be produced and that is absolutely critical. And so what we came out of was that the bureau that's the elected scientific leadership of IPCC will need to produce proposals on a timetable for the next plenary which will take place in late July and there the firm decisions about a timetable would actually be reached and I think the tension there in the discussion if I can reduce it to one dimension it's this question what is available for the second global stock take versus how comprehensive the scientific assessment can be and that was really the access along which a lot of the debate was taking place. So the working group could working group coaches assure us that they can produce three working group reports in time for the second global stock take but the question is how comprehensive there will be will there be new initiatives that might be missed because the cutoff dates with literature are too early that's the kind of issue we need to discuss. And does that mean a more accelerated process than in previous years given the time? Yeah indeed in governments have also been calling for shorter and more focused less verbose reports so we are actually giving active consideration to how the IPCC reports could really truly focus on what is new rather than being encyclopedias of all the knowledge that has ever ever been produced. I mean the literature on climate change is doubling every cycle it's an enormous challenge which we have to give some consideration to and this question of focus on what is new rather than summarizing everything that is possibly known about climate change is a challenge we need to address. Thank you Jim we'll come back when we've got some other questions but let me pass to Madeline. Madeline maybe I could ask you equally the same question about what are you looking forward to for the 2024 and what are some of the key topics but maybe one of the other questions that has been raised that partly follows on from Yamakani's answer about financing needs. What do you see as the big sources of finance that you're going to need Senegal being one example of a country needing that finance? What do you see as those big sources and what's your expectation for how much of this should come from public funds opposed to other sources? But Madeline over to you. Thank you Tom for this question regarding the resources as we say by Yamakani we're talking about trillion of US dollar being available in order to help developing countries really to implement by NDCs and also move in a low carbon development pathway and also tackle the issue of adaptation and and and lost and damage so I think we're talking about or as we say a lot of money available in order really to to to to to to support countries in particular small vulnerable countries. I just want to mention this resource is not really so big compared to what we see going for for some crisis we're so involved for the COVID for also everywhere we see between Ukraine and Russia. So the international community was being able to mobilize really in a short period this resource so it's not so much as we might thinking this is possible to mobilize in order really to tackle the issue of climate change and I think this is key and in order also to to fix for 1.5 by 2050 I think this is key so we can do that. So saying that for Senegal I think yes we're looking for public fund we're looking for public support coming from the global international world in order to tackle the issue of adaptation it's really key for us we are in Senegal facing the issue of coastal erosion with his implication soil salivization, loss of land, the issue also of agriculture we're having really some high pressure around agricultural productivities due to really climate change problem lack of rain or having some problem with also flood we need to to to deplace some population and provide them a new area so this is a lot of cost for small countries like us we are LDC so having to face that for a country having a small budget national budget you can see how how how difficult is for our government and how kind of pressure they are having at the political level due to something that we are not responsible so this is what I want to say so these resources can come from have to come from the global world we're looking for grant we're looking also for highly highly concessional support if we need to to invest on some infrastructure so this is also something we have to discuss with bank and with the support of the global communities on on the process to to really make this support as what we call a solidarity support for all of us thank you thank you Madeline um yes lots of comments in the chat and others about the nature of finance this question of loans and grants and sources of funding and so on and I wonder Nicola maybe I could turn to you there's several questions equally related to locally led adaptation localization everybody's talking about getting money where it matters how to kind of rethink the international financial system to get money to the communities on the front line much more efficiently some I think in the questions have even suggested we need to do away with implementing agencies and you know get rid of some of the pipe work and so on I know this is a topic that you and and colleagues here in IID work on a lot but can you give your sense of of I suppose issues of quality of finance not just quantity of finance which I suppose threatens to to dominate what's your view on that yeah thanks Tom so yeah I saw several questions coming through about this and as I mentioned earlier we are seeing kind of quite an increased focus on locally led adaptation community based adaptation these sorts of initiatives which is obviously really great and really positive that there's kind of this recognition recognition building that finance does need to reach the local level in order for it to be effective and kind of not get stuck kind of further up in the delivery chain with intermediaries implementing agencies etc but I think what's really important to recognize here is that this does need to be a kind of almost like whole of society or like whole system change it's not just the case of addressing one you know one small level an issue that the local level or you know what another at a different level it really needs to be almost like a change in consciousness I guess of how really how we deliver finance and who is accountable for that finance and making an increase in kind of downward accountability to that and this is something that I have been working on for quite some time and we've had recently received support from the Netherlands government which will support us and some partners to grow our work on LA the coming five years and one of this like this issue is exactly the key which we're wanting to look at kind of generating further ambition on LA to really scale it up so it becomes more of like I say an LA movement maybe rather than just you know something that's happening here and there but really isn't kind of widely taken up there are a few great examples of where this is already happening and certainly in Bangladesh they have a national platform for LA and this is this space at the national level where funding can come in and be influenced by local organizations and it would be really great to see something similar happening perhaps in other countries other country governments and there is already an LA community of practice where organizations and governments who have endorsed the principles for LA can kind of come together and share experiences on this and we have been seeing more and more organizations come to endorse these principles which is really promising kind of and hopeful for the future that we will start to see changes trickling through into the way finance is delivered so there's plenty of existing initiatives and examples already but we're really hoping to scale this up and see new ones emerging and in a way that we can where we can bring together actors from kind of all levels of society and public sector private sector and everywhere to work on LA and as we move forward with the work it's a really good point. Thank you Nicola and I think others are always commenting that locally led doesn't mean just about getting money to the local level it's also about the mindset the approach the as you said the system shift that we need to see that puts puts greater I suppose ownership and guidance from local communities at the heart of that process but I think you highlighted some really good examples Jim let me turn back to you a couple of questions for you and I suppose this is this is kind of channeling some of the journalists here that are saying what's your perspective on the 1.5 degree target and when that could be breached and what is the implications for that and then secondly what does the IPCC's view on this question of climate finance needs and sources is that something that the IPCC's given guidance on before and and how should we think about the the contribution that IPCC make can make to this this key key topic. Yeah on the first one Tom I think it depends what you mean by the 1.5 target because conventionally it is meant to mean the middle of a 20-year average which means in principle you will never know until 10 years after the event whether you've actually actually passed it and I think that is still technically possible to do that within the 21st century but that does not mean that we will not breach 1.5 degrees in individual years including within this decade possibly that could certainly happen on working group one of IPCC in the last cycle I think I said it was likely that it would be breached even in some of the more ambitious mitigation scenarios. The second question Tom just remind me again yeah was what's the IPCC's view on this topic of climate finance and particularly the needs but also the sources many people are talking about the fact that there's really stretched public funding available so what are the ways in which the IPCC is assessed that funding needs could be met? Yeah I mean just as I said earlier I think this was done more thoroughly in working group three in the last cycle on mitigation where frankly the quantified information is easier to pick up on and I think the big difference between adaptation and mitigation is that there's a lot of private finance going into mitigation whereas adaptation funding is almost entirely from public sources and I think one of the things that IPCC will need to to deal with in the next cycle is this question of where private finance might be available on the adaptation side as well. If Madeline's absolutely right there's enough money in the world to deal with these problems it's a question of how you get it to the right places and the level of trillions it probably means private finance as well as public finance to make it happen and I guess my hope would be if we do more work on indicators metrics targets etc that you can actually produce indicators that would allow adaptation projects to be bankable in a bigger way for the private sector in the future that's a bit of speculation but honestly I don't think that the public sources are going to be are deep enough to deal with all the challenges and we are going to need to think much more about the issue of how you get private finance focused on adaptation as well as on mitigation which has happened in the past we're quite frankly the metrics are easy for mitigation carbon dioxide equivalent is there as a number the metrics aren't really there on the adaptation side at the moment. Thank you Jim and maybe I'll pass the last comment of this session to Yamakani. Yamakani let me give you a choice of questions to answer one of them relates to the impact of elections this year obviously there's so many elections around the world how do you see the impact of those elections shaping what's possible at COP 29 and I suppose the second question is from the perspective of least developed countries now having to deal with huge impacts of climate change but also make choices about energy futures whether to exploit fossil fuel resources whether to consider not doing that and look for other sources and so on how do you see that kind of balancing act or kind of you know development choices really shaping the way in which politicians lead in the countries you're most familiar yeah thank you very much for the two important questions so first of all on the elections yeah that's a very important and it's something which for us LDCs sometimes it really becomes a huge concern because it's mainly comes an issue where the leaders whom we all look upon when they're really not flow climate change yeah so it becomes a very big problem for us so we are hoping for the best to make sure that those who are elected really are those who understand that climate change is real and indeed it affects the most vulnerable countries most because we have nothing to do with climate change but the impacts are so high so we are hoping that the outcomes of the elections in the sense that those who be having the leadership those who support or are also concerned about the climate change and who also needs to do action otherwise it will be a major setback for the world as far as climate change is concerned considering that as I mentioned earlier on the momentum we have built coming from COP28 COP27 the issues of loss and damage are now there everyone understands the huge impacts we all need to take action in addressing the loss and damage and the issue of livestock take the gaps are quite clear and now we had the issue of transitioning away from fossil fuel so all these two being practice we need leaders who will drive this agenda way forward so we are hoping for the best in in in that regards but now coming to the second question on balancing the development and climate action for us we believe that for the LDC is it's not a matter of choosing which way to go so it's a matter of survival so we need to consider climate change as a developmental issue indeed so in our perspective giving the LDCs and the most vulnerable countries enough support to address climate as well as the development needs I think there will be no way of coming back to do the fossil fuels and and so on because what lacks now is the need to drive the sustainable development in most of the vulnerable countries so as long as we have enough support enough means of implementation enough resources to address our energy poverty in our countries as well as the developmental needs I think there will be no way LDCs will be happy to do more emissions because currently our emissions are most negligible and indeed as LDCs we are driving the 1.5 it's the LDCs who have been making sure that we keep the 1.5 degrees alive so there's no way LDCs we can go back to say we need to go away with the 1.5 because it's a matter of survival for us so as long as there is enough resources I repeat as long as we have enough resources to help us do away from bad energy to scale out the renewable energy for example the solar and other hydroelectric energies that will continue and you see that most of the LDCs they are more renewable sources in their energy mix so we hope that that support will continue and it will be scaled out more and from the COP28 we saw the declarations as well as agreements which ensures us that they'll be scaling up of renewable energy sources so as long as that reaches the LDCs who are most needing those technologies then there will be no need to do the fossil fuels. Thank you Yamakani and we are going to have to close it there we're over time but can I just say a big thanks to everybody who's contributed whether it's with questions or responses to what you've heard and certainly to our panelists please join me in thanking Madeline and Yamakani and Jim and Nicola which I think has been an incredible session in terms of the coverage of lots of different topics huge numbers of issues being raised and certainly a lot of perspectives on finance too and so just to reflect that 2024 is going to be one of those years where everybody involved in this kind of movement to tackle climate change and the nature crisis is going to have to deal with many many different factors many steps along the way lots of opportunities to meet and really do look forward to IED playing a really key supportive role in the agenda this year and again big thanks to everybody who's helped organize this session really sorry we weren't able to get to the location in London to host people in in person but really do look out for future IED debates and podcasts coming out very shortly but thank you very much thanks again to the panelists and and have a great rest of the day bye bye