Action for Climate Empowerment (ACE) denotes work under Article 6 of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC, 1992) and Article 12 of the Paris Agreement (2015) and their six elements: Climate Change Education, Training, Public Awareness, Public Access to Information, Public Participation, and International Cooperation on these issues.

Implementation of all six elements has increasingly been recognized as crucial in solving the complex challenges presented by climate change. This is also reflected in the Sustainable Development Goals (for example SDG targets 4.7 and 13.3) to which the ACE agenda is closely related.

For more information on ACE, please click here.

In line with the Doha work programme on Article 6 of the Convention (2012-2020), ACE shall be guided by the following principles:

• a country-driven approach according to the national circumstances;
• gender and an intergenerational approach;
• a phased approach integrating ACE into existing climate change policies, programmes and strategies;
•  an interdisciplinary multi-sectoral, multi-stakeholder and participatory approach;
• promotion of partnerships, networks and synergies;
•  the principles of sustainable development.

The Paris Agreement requires Parties to communicate a Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) every five years, each time representing a progression from previous efforts and reflecting the maximum ambition that the country can put together on the basis of its capacity. By 2020, those countries that have already submitted an NDC with a time frame up to 2025 are requested to communicate a new NDC, and the countries with an NDC with a time frame up to 2030 are requested to communicate a new NDC or update their existing NDC.

For overall guidance on how to establish a multi-stakeholder NDC enhancement process, please refer to the UNDP “Guide to Strengthening National Climate Plans by 2020”.

Activities regarding all six priority elements of ACE are essential, both for climate change mitigation and adaptation: ACE prepares individuals, decision makers, government entities, productive sectors and society at large for the challenges that climate change brings, and empowers them to act upon these.

ACE is a key cross-cutting instrument involving all levels of governance and all actors in the society in climate action and in support of all elements of mitigation and adaptation. It has the potential to provide the social and political will for action, in addition to the required scientific and technological knowhow. ACE commitments, as non-GHG targets, can help accelerate the achievement of the GHG-related targets, and should, therefore, be included in NDC target-setting in concrete and measurable ways.

At COP24 in Katowice, Poland (2018), Parties recognized the importance of ACE in the Katowice Climate Package – the Paris Agreement Work Programme – which includes “Ways of enhancing the implementation of education, training, public awareness, public participation and public access to information so as to enhance actions under the Paris Agreement”. By this decision, Parties agreed:

“to continue to promote the systematic integration of gender-sensitive and participatory education, training, public awareness, public participation, public access to information, and regional and international cooperation into all mitigation and adaptation activities implemented under the Convention, as well as under the Paris Agreement, as appropriate, including into the processes of designing and implementing their nationally determined contributions” (Decision 17/CMA.1, paragraph 5)

In order to raise ambition that addresses the Paris Agreement holistically, and to present an inclusive NDC, it is therefore crucial to integrate considerations of ACE into the NDC review process.

The first step to integrate ACE into an NDC in a holistic way is to commit – if this is not already the case – to developing a national ACE strategy and to integrating ACE into climate change and sectoral policy. For this, it is important that all ACE and NDC focal points and education stakeholders come together, arrange knowledge transfer and engage in regular exchanges and collaboration.

For a detailed step-by-step guide on how to develop an ACE national strategy and action plan, please see the “ACE: guidelines for accelerating solutions through education, training and public awareness” developed by UNESCO and the UNFCCC Secretariat (2016).

Information on objectives, as well as suggested targets, for each of the six elements of ACE, that can be adapted to the specific national/regional contexts and addressed in NDCs are listed in the sections below. It is recommended to integrate these into the core NDC components rather than place them in a separate section, as strategies/means to achieve the respective mitigation and adaptation commitments.

Objectives

•  Promote, facilitate, develop and implement formal, non-formal and informal climate education programmes that encourage climate-friendly behaviour, focusing on both mitigation and adaptation;
• Include climate change at all levels and across disciplines in both school and higher education curricula, as well as in technical and vocational education and training (TVET) and adult education, addressing the entire population;
• Develop pedagogical resources/material that take into account different knowledge systems, including indigenous knowledge, as well as local languages;
•  Implement quality pre-service and in-service teacher training focused on climate change.

Examples of Targets

We recommend that the above be integrated into the NDC with specific, simple and measurable
targets. For example:

•  By 2025, include climate learning into (a) national education policies, (b) curricula, (c) teacher education and (d) assessment, including cognitive as well as socio-emotional and behavioural learning objectives.
• Introduce an integral inter-disciplinary climate module into all higher education degrees. By 2030, ensure that all university students have an opportunity to take this module before graduation.
• Develop an integral component on climate change mitigation and adaptation for all teacher training. By 2030, ensure that x% of teachers have completed this component.

Objectives

• Identify and anticipate current and future skills and training needs for the green transition, taking into account different population groups and ensuring equitable access;
• Integrate and mainstream climate change learning into the curricula of institutions that provide formal training at all levels, including professional bodies, apprenticeship programmes and trade bodies;
• Develop training materials in accordance with national circumstances, sectoral approaches and the cultural context;
• Cooperate in, promote, facilitate, develop and implement training programmes (including training of trainers) focused on climate change for groups with a key role, such as policy and decision makers, scientific, technical and managerial personnel in the public and private sectors, journalists, women, youth and community leaders at the local, national, subregional, regional, sectoral and international levels;
• Facilitate non-formal training through the engagement and participation of youth in local and national climate change events, and build the capacity of youth as future leaders.

Examples of Concrete Targets

We recommend that the above be integrated into the NDC with specific, simple and measurable targets. For example:

• By 2025, ensure that x% of government employees at a) national and b) sub-national levels have received training on climate change adaptation and mitigation.
• Train x% of municipalities on proper waste management and separation, energy efficiency, water management/efficiency, green infrastructure and other climate change related issues.
• Organize x number of gender-balanced capacity-building workshops for youth organizations on skills for green jobs.
• Collaborate with private sector partners to ensure that by 2030, x% of male and female employees in key sectors of the economy (e.g. utilities, energy, transportation, food and agriculture) are trained in climate change mitigation and adaptation skills and measures specific to their area of work.

Objectives

• Cooperate in, promote, facilitate, develop and implement inclusive public awareness programmes on climate change and its effects at the local, regional and national levels as appropriate;
• Create key messages that make it simple and fun for people to take climate action and develop and implement action campaigns to encourage people to do small, easy things that can lead to lasting change, such as reducing their personal water or electricity use;
• Encourage, by means of popular media, personal action and contributions to address climate change, support climate-friendly policies and foster behavioural changes, noting the important role that social media and digital platforms and strategies can play in this context;
• Collaborate with civil society and private sector partners to ensure wide dissemination of public awareness-raising activities and limit the spread of ‘fake news’ and disinformation campaigns;
• Conduct surveys to establish a baseline of public awareness, which can serve as a basis for further work and support the monitoring of the impact of activities;
• Recognize and engage youth as knowledge holders and support the participation of youth as agents of change and/or trainers in public awareness campaigns.

Examples of Targets

We recommend that the above be integrated into the NDC with specific, simple and measurable targets. For example:

• Develop and roll-out a public awareness campaign, including through national broadcasting media, explaining the components of the country’s NDC and climate policy.
• Use advertising, social media and public events to advocate for behavioural changes to promote sustainable consumption, energy efficiency and other climate-friendly actions, while also outlining the economic advantages of such behavioural change. Where possible, collect sex-disaggregated data on the impact of these activities on individuals and communities.

Objectives

• Guarantee public access to information and related data on good practices, climate change initiatives, policies and results of actions, so that the public can understand and respond to climate change. This effort should harness new information technologies, taking into account factors such as quality of Internet access, literacy, gender and language issues.

Examples of Targets

We recommend that the above be integrated into the NDC with specific, simple and measurable targets. For example:

• Provide comprehensive, accurate and accessible information related to climate change on a) national and b) sub-national government websites.
• Develop guidance supporting accurate reporting on climate change in news outlets.
• Develop effective regulations for transparency and full disclosure of information related to climate change by the private sector.
• Translate into appropriate languages and distribute popularized versions of key documents on climate change, including assessment reports and other reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Objectives

• Foster the participation of intergovernmental organizations (IGOs), regional and local authorities, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and community-based organizations, as well as the private and public sectors, in order to raise awareness and increase understanding of the causes and impacts of climate change, as well as solutions that lead to measurable outcomes;
• Create and support open and accessible multi-stakeholder platforms for public participation and dialogue engaging youth, civil society, academia and the private sector in order to reach whole-of-society consensus on climate action and NDC ambition;
•  Promote social dialogue and inclusive public participation in addressing climate change and its effects and in developing adequate responses, by facilitating feedback, debate and partnership in climate change activities and in governance, noting the important role that social media platforms and strategies can play in this context;
• Strengthen the science, policy and society interface by encouraging the participation of citizens as co-producers of knowledge (citizen science).

Examples of Targets

We recommend that the above be integrated into the NDC with specific, simple and measurable targets. For example:

•  Organize x number of consultations (through public meetings, workshops, online surveys, etc.) with public, private, and civil society stakeholders, including youth organizations, to advise on the development of a national ACE Strategy and its implementation.
• Establish a multi-stakeholder advisory committee bringing together x number of government agencies, x non-governmental organizations, and x private sector representatives to be consulted on all major mitigation and adaptation measures, and to support the implementation of the national ACE strategy.
• Establish a gender-balanced citizen consultation council on climate change to ensure a forum for citizen participation (including with wide participation from the private sector, civil society organizations and academia) and create working groups for specific ACE, mitigation and adaptation sectorial reforms.

Objectives

•  Foster subregional, regional, sectoral and international cooperation in undertaking activities within the scope of ACE to enhance the collective ability of Parties and non-Party stakeholders to implement the Convention and the Paris Agreement;
•  Document and share knowledge between countries regarding experiences, lessons learned, good practices and challenges in the implementation of ACE and promote peer learning, so that Parties, IGOs and NGOs that have the resources to do so might effectively target their efforts at providing appropriate support;
•  Develop and encourage international exchange programmes between government professionals, teachers, students and researchers with respect to training on climate change.

Examples of Targets

We recommend that the above be integrated into the NDC with specific, simple and measurable targets. For example:

• Appoint a national focal point for ACE to reinforce direct exchange and collaboration on ACE with other ACE national focal points around the world, as well as with UNFCCC, UNESCO, UNITAR and other UN agencies, and participate in annual ACE dialogues and training opportunities for ACE focal points.
• Use existing mechanisms of collaboration to share good practices on all elements of ACE, for example during annual meetings of regional multilateral organizations.
• Organize a bilateral/multilateral annual exchange programme with x number of countries to exchange government officials working on ACE, climate change adaptation and mitigation measures during a period of 6 months.

For more information, see the links below

•    Integrating Action for Climate Empowerment into Nationally Determined Contributions - A short guide for countries
•    Guide on how to develop an ACE national strategy: Action for Climate Empowerment: Guidelines for accelerating solutions through education, training and public awareness
•    NDC Partnership website
•    NDC Interim Registry
•    Guide to Strengthening National Climate Plans by 2020