Climate resilience through social protection
Growing climate crises pose civilization-scale threats. Climate risks are already putting livelihoods, people, and ecosystems at risk. They threaten to reverse the gains of development achieved over the last few decades. According to recent estimates, climate change may thrust more than 720 million people back into poverty by 2050. It may also force 140 million people to become climate refugees. Escalating climate crises demand a concerted global response towards a transition that supports the vulnerable and strengthens their capabilities.
Better alignment and integration of social protection with climate adaptation is critically important for addressing climate change risks. The importance of social protection for climate adaptation stems from its scope and scale, its substantial institutional infrastructure with the capacity to reach hundreds of millions of vulnerable households, its overlap in objectives with climate adaptation goals, and its positive outcomes for wellbeing and vulnerability reduction.
Countries in the global South invest more than US$500 billion annually in social protection; globally, such investments exceed US$2 trillion. Nearly one-third of thepopulation in low and middle-income countries bene ts from some form of social protection. These bene tsow in greater proportion towards the poor and thevulnerable, making social protection vitally important for climate justice goals, too. Indeed, both social protection and climate adaptation instruments seek to support the wellbeing of the vulnerable and the poor.
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