English Version(O conteúdo que você vai ler a seguir é feito totalmente por humanos, e para humanos)
‘Implementation COP’ is a term that has been repeated constantly since Brazil assumed its role as the incoming COP 30 Presidency. The call to focus on implementation has come both from civil society frustrated with the grossly insufficient speed and scale of climate action and from the Presidency itself, as it tries to manage expectations regarding major negotiated breakthroughs in Belém.
But what would a pivot towards implementation look like? You would probably imagine less time given to fighting over commas, more time given to sharing best practices to accelerate action, and Parties and non-Parties holding each other accountable for their commitments in a spirit of cooperation and solidarity. Turning this into reality, however, requires change within and outside of the negotiations.
Outside negotiations, it requires elevating efforts occurring at the national and local levels and in both the public and private sector. In short, where implementation really happens. Brazil has already taken steps towards this through placing a strong focus on the Action Agenda for COP 30. Their initiative to galvanize a global mutirão and launch processes like the Circle of Finance Ministers, Circle of Peoples and Global Ethical Stocktake further support these efforts. But even with these advances, the multilateral process still has to connect global signals to the realities of domestic delivery.
Synthesis reports on different elements of the Paris Agreement – from NDCs to BTRs to NAPs – are expected before Belém. They will help set the scene, but they will not, on their own, define COP 30’s legacy as the ‘implementation COP’. That will depend on whether the process itself shifts toward implementation.
Pivoting towards implementation within the negotiations
But what about within the negotiations? A meaningful answer to this is necessary for the credibility of a system built for negotiations, when there is increasingly little to negotiate. And as it turns out, COP 30 has one potential answer sitting right in front of it: the Facilitative Multilateral Consideration of Progress (FMCP).
The FMCP is the critical piece of the Paris Agreement transparency architecture where the global spotlight is put on implementation. Building on submissions of Biennial Transparency Reports (BTRs), the FMCP is where Parties have their progress towards Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and climate finance efforts under Article 9 considered by the international community.
The FMCP replaces the Multilateral Assessment and Facilitative Sharing of Views that served similar purposes under the Convention’s transparency arrangements. While these were largely technical exercises that received little attention at COPs, the FMCP has much greater political relevance due to the more objective goals of the Paris Agreement (such as limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees) and its focus on NDCs and climate finance.
Procedurally, the FMCP involves participating countries presenting on their progress and responding to written questions ahead of SB sessions and in person as part of a formal meeting during sessions. The first session of the FMCP was held during SB 62 in Bonn with just three Parties participating. The Secretariat also trialed an informal dialogue after the formal meeting to support further engagement and peer learning.
But COP 30 (and SB 63) will be on a different scale. It will be the first COP where the FMCP is operational and early signs suggest as many as 15 Parties could participate. As of August 11, there are already 9 Parties confirmed, including the European Union, South Africa, Switzerland, and Cote d’Ivoire.
Brazil has the unique opportunity with its Presidency to make a lasting shift towards implementation in the UN climate process by leveraging the FMCP. As part of true ‘implementation COP’, the FMCP in Belém should not just be a transparency tick-box exercise, but where Parties are for the first time properly held to account by the CMA for implementing their NDCs and climate finance commitments. In doing so, COp 30 would be making a lasting contribution to effective reform of the multilateral system.
Making the FMCP central to the legacy of an ‘implementation COP’
Brazil can put implementation centre-stage at COP 30 by organising the FMCP at scale and giving it significant political attention within the negotiations. Here are three key steps Brazil should take to deliver this:
- Provide significant time in the agenda for the FMCP. The first FMCP session at SB 62 took several hours to get through 3 Parties. To cater for 20 or more Parties, Brazil must dedicate significant agenda time to the FMCP throughout the two weeks of COP 30. This allocation of agenda time should not be seen as a burden but embraced as part of the COP evolving to rightly make implementation a central element of the multilateral process moving forward.
- Volunteer Brazil to go first at the FMCP in Belém and bring Ministerial representation. As host of the first COP featuring the FMCP, Brazil going first with Ministerial representation would send a powerful message that they are serious about COP 30 being an ‘implementation COP’ and that the FMCP will be a major feature of the process moving forward. Alternatively, Brazil volunteering to go first at SB 64 in June 2026 would also help solidify the implementation legacy of their Presidency and bring profile to the mid-year version of the FMCP. However, this would mean additional efforts are required to give the FMCP sufficient prominence at COP 30 to compensate for the absence of Brazil’s participation.
- Frame the FMCP as a critical piece of COP 30, the response to the NDC ambition gap, and reform of the multilateral system. By using their Presidency platform, Brazil can shape the narrative and elevate the political importance of the FMCP ahead of COP 30. This should be done through a Presidency letter and at pre-COP. Brazil should also encourage other G20 economies to join the list for COP 30. With sufficient political attention and the participation of other major emitters alongside Brazil, the EU and South Africa, the FMCP could deliver an ambitious message of mitigation commitment and form an important piece of COP 30’s response to the NDC synthesis report.
