Blog Posts: equity

More than two years after the adoption and signing of the historic Paris Agreement on climate change, and following its unprecedented rapid entry-into-force, the hard work of implementing the Paris Agreement is just getting going. Turning this landmark pact into a functioning regime requires adopting the rules of the game...

Affordable housing is a critical need in the cities of the global south. Innovative approaches can help replace slums with healthier environments.

Once every 20 years, the world's urban leaders gather to determine the best course of action for the world's cities. This year, at Habitat III, the 21st century challenges for cities are clear. WRI's World Resources Report examines whether providing equitable access to services can make cities more economically productive and environmentally sustainable.

Tackling inequality in the world's cities can be a crucial way to foster urban development, improve the environment and spur the economy.

After two weeks of difficult negotiations and a nail-biting finale, delegates in Lima laid the groundwork for a successful international climate agreement in Paris next year.

What is an equitable way of taking action in the context of growing emissions and climate impacts, from water scarcity and depressed agricultural yields to severe weather events?

And how can we reduce emissions and build climate resilience while taking into account varying human development needs?

Recent data reveals only 10 countries produce around 70 percent of global GHG emissions.

Here's a closer look at these top 10 emitters—based on our Climate Analysis Indicators Tool.

How should countries decide what to put into their national emissions reduction plans, and how should they be evaluated? What should governments, civil society, and the private sector take into account in thinking about the equitability of a country’s actions?

WRI’s new online tool, the CAIT Equity Explorer, aims to help answer these questions.

Manish Bapna highlights five standout climate and energy stories of 2013, which point to signs that some businesses, consumers, and governments are moving toward a growing understanding of the risks of climate change. The question is whether this heightened awareness will shift a global course quickly enough to reduce negative climate impacts. This blog post was originally published at Forbes.

This year’s climate negotiations in Warsaw, Poland (COP 19) were a bit of a mixed bag. On the one hand, the summit’s outcomes were dramatically out of step with the level of action needed to solve the climate change problem. A tempting metaphor for the talks was the national stadium in which they were held– one could go around in endless circles in search of the right location.

On the other hand, the Warsaw COP did achieve the incremental outcomes needed to move the process forward. Negotiators put in place a work plan for securing an international climate agreement at COP 21 in Paris in 2015. The COP also made progress on scaling up climate finance and addressing the difficult issue of loss and damage, a process for addressing climate impacts that are difficult or impossible to adapt to. These are small but important steps toward bringing countries out of their repetitive, circular discussions and closer to agreeing collectively on how to address global climate change.