Vietnam joins the Netherlands in the Global Commission on Adaptation to build resilience to the impacts of climate change
V
ietnam is one of the most vulnerable countries in the world to the impacts of climate change. More than a third of the country’s delta area could be underwater by the year 2100 and the number of hot days (more than 35 degrees Celsius) is projected to increase from 35 to 45 per year by 2050.
To help respond to these challenges the Vietnamese Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, Tran Hong Ha, has accepted the invitation from the Government of the Netherlands to join the Global Commission on Adaptation, a growing, global movement of countries committed to accelerating adaptation action. In signing a joint declaration with the Dutch Minister of Infrastructure and Water Management, Cora van Nieuwenhuizen, witnessed by Prime Minister Rutte and Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc, the two countries have agreed to work closely together to accelerate action on adaptation to support greater resilience, tackle extreme poverty and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.
Both countries can contribute respective perspectives and expertise to the Global Commission on Adaptation such as the Dutch expertise of delta management, infrastructure development and water management and the Vietnamese knowledge and experience in agricultural transformation, actively living with nature, and governance issues in the Mekong Delta.
Their experiences will support the Action Tracks being developed by the Global Commission on Adaptation on food security, infrastructure, finance, local action, cities and nature-based solutions, which will build on existing initiatives to give them added impetus to set and scale tangible targets. They will also support a compelling vision for scaled-up and transformative action which will be presented in a flagship report, to be released in September 2019, ahead of the United Nations Secretary General’s Climate Summit.
