Climate Change

Our main focus is on implementing the Lake Victoria Commonwealth Climate Change Action Plan, a set of resolutions aimed at addressing the negative impacts of climate change. Emphasis is placed on strengthening the quality and participation of highly vulnerable member states in international negotiations on climate change. We also use high-level forums to help senior representatives from governments share experiences, knowledge and expertise to address the human and social impacts of climate change. Emphasis is given to analysing the economics of climate change, helping countries manage the challenges of climate change and identifying new opportunities created through international climate policies and approaches.

• Leaflet on Climate Change and the Commonwealth >>
  

Key Climate Change Declarations

The Commonwealth Secretariat’s work on climate change is guided by these declarations and plans of action agreed by Commonwealth member states:

• Port of Spain Climate Change Declaration

Commonwealth Heads of Government convened a Special Session on Climate Change at their 2009 summit in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, to discuss their concern about the threat that climate change poses to the security, prosperity, economic and social development of Commonwealth peoples. | Read more...

• Lake Victoria Commonwealth Climate Change Action Plan

At Lake Victoria in Uganda in 2007, Commonwealth Heads of Government concluded that climate change presented a ‘direct threat to the very survival of some Commonwealth countries’, and agreed an action plan to be pursued by its members. The Commonwealth Secretariat, with its track record in building trust between nations, is today working to realise the aspirations of Lake Victoria with the support of member states, carrying out collective will of Heads of Government and helping partners, governments and people to find solutions to realities of climate change. | Read more...

• Langkawi Declaration

In 1987 Commonwealth Heads of Government commissioned a landmark scientific study on the effects of variations to the world’s climate. Led by eminent British scientist Martin Holdgate and published in 1989, the study warned of the calamitous risks of inaction, including ‘severe tropical storms, floods, droughts or extremes of heat’, concluding that the poor would be the ‘main victims’ of a rise in worldwide temperature. That same year, leaders agreed the Langkawi Declaration on Environment – a powerful statement which went on to influence the Rio Earth Summit Declaration of 1992, which still guides the agenda on environmentally sustainable development. | Read more...