The sixteenth meeting of the Conference of Parties (COP 16) to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) will resume in Rome, Italy, next week. Delegates will work to reach consensus on issues left unresolved during last year’s sessions in Cali, Colombia. With hopes high and critical issues on the table, decisions made in Rome could redefine global biodiversity conservation in the face of accelerating environmental threats. ICIMOD’s dedicated team will be there to keep mountains high on the agenda.
A dedicated cross-chapter paper on ‘mountains’ has been incorporated into the report outline for the upcoming 7th IPCC Assessment Report, reflecting the urgency of addressing mountain-specific climate impacts.
Mountain ecosystems are among the most vulnerable to climate change. Rising temperatures and challenges brought by climate change, such as a changing cryosphere, water scarcity, and biodiversity loss, have severe socio-economic consequences that impact the lives and livelihoods of mountain communities, rendering them more vulnerable. In response to this, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the United Nations body for assessing science related to climate change, has drawn attention to the need to respond to the impacts of climate change in mountain regions since 2023, in its Sixth Assessment Report (AR6).
The IPCC’s Assessment Reports, published every five to seven years, provide a comprehensive scientific assessment of climate change, its impacts, and potential future risks. By providing an outlook on current and future climate scenarios, the assessments inform, and influence governments’ climate change mitigation and adaptation plans, as well as their investments in climate actions.
Push to include the mountain agenda in the 7th IPCC Assessment Report
As the upcoming Seventh Assessment Report (AR7) is being prepared, there has been a push to more systematically include the ‘mountain agenda’ in the report, especially from a number of mountain nations. ‘Mountain agenda’ is a catch-all phrase to highlight and address the vulnerabilities of mountain people and to respond to the impacts of climate change on mountain regions.
At the 62nd IPCC meeting (IPCC 62), which took place from 24 February to 1 March 2025 in Hangzhou, China, delegates from 195 member countries discussed and agreed on the outline and key topics for the upcoming assessment report, AR7. The Panel’s agreement included the work of defining the scientific content of AR7, organised around the IPCC’s three Working Groups which assess (I) the physical science basis of climate change, (II) impacts, adaptation and vulnerability, and (III) mitigation of climate change.
Representatives from six of ICIMOD’s eight Regional Member Countries (RMCs) – Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Nepal, and Pakistan – participated in the IPCC 62 discussions. A number of RMCs led an intervention to request a dedicated chapter on ‘Mountains’ in the AR7. As a result, Working Group II endorsed a cross-chapter paper on ‘high altitude and mountains’, which is to be considered by the Working Group II authors. Furthermore, Working Group I will explicitly mention ‘mountain regions’ in its chapters on assessing regional climate and extremes and on earth system processes and changes. Cross-chapter papers synthesise information and insights from multiple chapters or Working Groups within the report to provide a more holistic and in-depth analysis of a specific topic.
Supporting loss and damage in the mountains and least developed countries
As defined by UNEP, ‘loss and damage’ in the context of climate change refers to the negative impacts, both economic and non-economic, that arise from the effects of climate change – particularly those that go beyond what people can adapt to, like the loss of life, property, and cultural heritage. The impact of climate change on ICIMOD’s RMCs includes increased loss and damage risks. These countries face rising threats from climate-induced disasters, including floods, landslides, droughts, and the melting of glaciers and snow, leading to loss of lives, ecosystem change, damage or destruction of infrastructure, and vanishing cultural heritage. Working Groups I and II of AR7 have included policy-relevant assessments for loss and damage in their outline, and Working Group II has a dedicated chapter on the subject. The topic is also assessed in multiple other chapters. The proposed AR7 chapter on loss and damage received unanimous support from ICIMOD’s RMCs.
RMCs that are also least developed countries (LDCs) joined hands in requesting the IPCC to assess information particularly relevant to LDCs. This led to Working Group II approving the inclusion of a cross-chapter paper on LDCs as a part of its regional assessment chapters.
AR7 decisions, delivery timeline, and next steps
Despite agreeing on the outline of all three Working Group reports, the Parties (member countries of the IPCC) did not reach a consensus on when the reports would be delivered, nor on the outline of the methodology report of the Task Force on National Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventory. Thus, these decisions have been postponed to the upcoming 63rd IPCC meeting to be held in Lima, Peru towards the end of 2025.
During plenary sessions, working group discussions, and informal group discussions at IPCC 62, some ICIMOD RMCs expressed the view that the AR7 report should be delivered in time for the Global Stock Take (GST) in 2028, while others feel that a more thorough review process is needed. This is consistent with past IPCC assessments, which typically take between five to seven years.
The Parties agreed that the Working Groups could begin to solicit author nominations and plan the first lead authors’ meeting as approved in the 2025 budget.
ICIMOD’s commitment to support the IPCC assessment process
ICIMOD has had observer status to the IPCC since 2012. Since then, our experts have been contributing to IPCC reports and special reports as coordinating lead authors, lead authors, contributing authors, and chapter scientists. ICIMOD co-hosted the IPCC lead author meeting for AR6 (Working Group II) in 2019 and has engaged in various IPCC outreach events.
ICIMOD will continue to work with the RMC governments and experts from the region to contribute to all the assessment areas raising and highlighting the mountain agenda. We will continuously provide support to authors on content that is important for mountain regions and their communities to raise their voices and build an evidence base for policy formulation. Furthermore, ICIMOD will work with its government partners to increase their capacity to meaningfully engage with and contribute to IPCC and other global assessment processes. To facilitate greater engagement from the region with the AR7 process, ICIMOD hosted a regional webinar featuring IPCC Bureau members in early April 2025, to build understanding of the expert nomination process and other engagement pathways for AR7.