Climate change presents the single biggest threat to sustainable development everywhere and its widespread, unprecedented impacts disproportionately burden the poorest and most vulnerable. 

Urgent action to halt climate change and deal with its impacts is integral to the successful implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

In her first address since the conclusion of the UN Climate Change Conference COP24 in Katowice last December, the UN’s top climate official Patricia Espinosa warned that whilst the meeting was a success, the world remained off course with regard to achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, and that all parts of society need to get far more engaged to prevent the worst climate impacts.