2025 is a key turning point for translating global climate commitments into action. It is the 10th anniversary of the Paris Agreement and the first full cycle of its implementation, since the conclusion of the Global Stocktake at the 28th Conference of the Parties (COP28) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Countries are expected to move into a five-year phase of delivering enhanced NDCs, which will be submitted before COP30 in November and will typically cover targets out to 2035. These updated NDCs are critical for correcting course, as current efforts remain off track to meeting the agreement’s goals.

This working paper provides a forward-looking analysis of how countries are integrating ocean-based climate actions into the 2025 NDCs submitted following the first Global Stocktake.

Key Findings:

Our analysis shows early findings of an upward trend: 62 percent of coastal and island countries (69 out of 111) included ocean actions in their 2015 NDCs, 73 percent (77 out of 106) in 2022, and 61 of the 66 updated coastal and island NDCs submitted since the GST include at least one ocean-based action.

This working paper was made possible through the support of Oceans 5. Oceans 5 is a sponsored project of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.

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