T he 2021 IPCC report was clear. We have no time to waste. The windows of opportunity for climate action are closing fast. And we have no Planet B. For many countries, it is adapt or die. We need to scale up and accelerate adaptation. Africa needs at least US$336 billion to secure the lives and livelihoods of the African people. Investing in adaptation is not only the right thing to do. It is the smart thing to do. The cost of inaction is 15 times higher than the cost of taking action.

The mainstreaming of water adaptation is necessary to accelerate a system-wide coherence on water across multiple agendas. Many adaptation practices and approaches already exist, but as the IPCC observes, the effort is fragmented and inadequate. At the same time, many policy actors and platforms are available to drive a transformative change, such as the UN Climate Change COPs and the upcoming UN Water 2023 Conference in New York.

The Water Adaptation Community is working to promote mainstreaming of water adaptation and to accelerate understanding and action in policy and in practice.

This series of videos is a call to action to mainstream water climate adaptation at a series of international events such COP27, the UN 2023 Water Conference and COP28.