The United Nations on Thursday launched a new disaster risk financing platform at COP31 in Turkey’s Antalya, aiming to secure access to more than $3 billion to protect 75 million people and their livelihoods from climate shocks by 2030.
Bringing together six UN agencies, the initiative seeks to address a major gap in humanitarian response. Less than 2% of global humanitarian financing is currently arranged in advance, leaving agencies heavily dependent on funds mobilised after disasters strike.
The UN Disaster Risk Financing Platform aims to make financing more predictable, allowing governments and humanitarian agencies to act ahead of floods, droughts, storms and other extreme weather events, rather than waiting for a crisis to unfold.
It will bring together the expertise and data of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), UNICEF, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the World Food Programme (WFP). It will also work with insurance companies and financial markets to expand access to pre-arranged financing and reduce the cost of such interventions.
The platform has already delivered initial results, with OCHA and UNICEF implementing insurance policies to provide a financial safety net for their anticipatory action programmes, supported by specialist insurance teams at WFP. IOM will contribute its expertise in displacement risk analysis, helping identify communities that can be protected before disasters force them to leave their homes.
“Disasters are increasingly predictable, yet the financing needed to act ahead of them remains slow and fragmented,” director of financing and outreach at OCHA, Lisa Doughten, said.
She said pre-arranged finance, deployed at scale and before crises escalate, was essential to better protect vulnerable communities and reduce humanitarian impacts.
Renewed calls
The launch came on a day when the summit also saw renewed calls to accelerate emissions reductions, particularly methane, which has a significant impact on near-term global warming.
Addressing the Leaders-Level Non-CO₂ Greenhouse Gases Summit on Thursday, UN climate chief Simon Stiell said methane cuts offered one of the fastest and cheapest ways to limit rising temperatures.
“In a world of suffocating disasters, action on methane offers breathing space,” he said. “It is one of the fastest, cheapest and most effective ways to check global heating in the near-term. While boosting economies, harvests, and health.”
Stiell pointed to the economic cost of continued methane emissions, including the flaring of natural gas during oil and gas production. Around 167 billion cubic metres of gas are flared annually, representing an estimated $54 billion in lost energy value, he said. He also highlighted a major financing gap, noting that in 2023, just 0.5% of climate finance earmarked for emissions reductions went towards super-pollutants.
More than 90% of countries, representing around three-quarters of global methane emissions, have included measures to reduce them in their latest national climate plans, or NDCs. “The task now is to turn those plans into action,” Stiell said, urging governments to prioritise methane reductions, strengthen policies across key sectors and mobilise public and private finance.
The urgency of the climate crisis was also underscored by climate activist Greta Thunberg, who returned to the COP talks after five years. In a sharp intervention on Thursday, she criticised governments and institutions for failing to adequately respond to the crisis.
“The planet is not dying. It is being killed,” she said, warning that the world was heading towards “more genocides and more ecocides” and a future where basic necessities could become luxuries. “No one is coming to our rescue,” she added, calling on people, particularly those with greater privilege, to stand up for human rights.
