Nigeria, others brainstorm on guidelines for implementation of Paris agreement

With increasing global heat waves, bushfires, droughts and floods, governments are convoking a meeting in Bangkok to prepare implementation guidelines of the Paris climate change agreement.

The guidelines will make the Paris Agreement work fairly and transparently for all countries involved.

Minister of State for the Environment, Ibrahim Jibril, will lead Nigeria’s delegation to the one-week summit. Following a two-year negotiation process, the implementation guidelines will be adopted at the annual climate conference, COP24 in Katowice, Poland in December.

While discussions have progressed modestly, the Bangkok meeting is seen as the last opportunity before COP24 to accelerate negotiations.

Executive Secretary of the United Nations (UN) Climate Change, Patricia Espinosa, said: “Building on the progress made, countries now need to take a decisive step forward in preparing a balanced outcome that we need in Katowice.”

Reaching success at COP24 will be challenging without the preparation of an official negotiating text on the implementation guidelines.

“It will be critical for negotiators in Bangkok to produce solid text-based output that can function as the basis for concluding negotiations in Katowice and be turned into the final implementation guidelines of the Paris Agreement at COP24. The texts capturing progress to date are not yet refined enough for this purpose.

“With only six additional days for negotiations in Bangkok, UN Climate Change is carefully coordinating demands to fully support countries in their important task,” she said.  

The implementation of the guidelines, which are highly technical, is needed to monitor progress on climate action, including measures to deal with climate impacts such as droughts or floods and urgent support to enable developing countries contribute to climate action.