Press Release on the COP22 Declaration on Accelerated Action on Adaptation in Transport

Thursday 17th November 2016

 Marrakech, Morocco. Today, on behalf of the transport and development community Cornie Huizenga, Secretary General of the Partnership on Sustainable, Low Carbon Transport (SLoCaT) and co-convener of the Paris Process on Mobility and Climate (PPMC) presented Patricia Espinosa, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) with the COP22 Declaration on Accelerated Action on Adaptation in Transport.

To date the transport sector´s action on climate change has been largely focused on mitigation. On Tuesday 9th November 2016 during a dedicated event on Transport Adaptation in Africa during the Marrakesh Climate Conference (COP22) and in response to the Moroccan Presidency’s political priority to increase attention to adaptation the transport and development community launched the COP22 Declaration on Accelerated Action on Adaptation in Transport.

In just 8 days the Declaration has been signed by 395 individuals and by 55 organizations including:

• World Bank
• International Energy Agency
• Global Environment Facility
• Islamic Development Bank
• International Road Federation
• PIANC
• International Union of Railways
• UN-ECE
• Nordic Development Fund
• International Association of Public Transport

Adaptation in the transport sector is necessary for both developed and developing countries. Transport systems worldwide are vulnerable to the increasing impacts of a changing climate and this increases the potential for catastrophic impacts. Resilient transport is important in disaster recovery. Transport systems and services are already being severely disrupted by climate related events with an ever growing number of incidents in both the developed and developing world.

Through the Declaration organizations and individuals endorsing the Declaration commit to:

• Raise the profile of adaptation in discussions on climate change and transport.
• Promote climate risk screening and vulnerability assessment of existing transport systems, services and all new projects.
• Encourage the use of approaches aimed at ‘adapt at construction and at asset renewal’.
• Encourage the upgrade and adoption of industry relevant technical standards to ensure transport infrastructures are climate resilient with appropriate adaptive capacities to minimize future risk.
• Leverage additional climate finance to shift public and private investments towards resilient transport systems.
• Integrate adaptation into system design and operation, including through enhanced emergency preparedness and adequately resourced maintenance activity.
• Strengthen coordination across agencies.
• Build capacity at local, national and international levels on transport adaptation.
• Integrate transport into general adaptation programs and activities, and strengthen coherence between sectors.
• Develop appropriate metrics, monitoring, evaluating and reporting procedures so we can continuously learn and adapt over long timescales.

“We are pleased by the broad support for the Declaration” said Cornie Huizenga, Secretary General, Partnership on Sustainable, Low Carbon Transport. “We are committed to develop a supportive Program of work in partnership with organizations that endorsed the declaration and present this for discussion at the next UNFCCC meeting in Bonn, Germany in May 2017 and we will also be happy to facilitate reporting on the implementation of the Declaration”.

The Declaration will remain open for further endorsements and can be found at: www.surveymonkey.com/r/36SYK9F

For more information please contact: Mark Major: Mark.major@slocatpartnership.org Talya Enriquez Romano: talya.enriquezromano@slocatpartnership.org