Effective climate action is critical to achieve the Paris Agreement goals. Countries use different policy approaches to meet their mitigation goals. These approaches are the result of a complex interaction of past climate action, climate ambitions, emissions profile, and available technologies, as well as countries’ cultural, social, political, and institutional conditions. There is no one-size-fits-all policy approach. However, there is evidence that current policy implementation is not sufficient to achieve countries’ declared policy commitments, implying that there is an implementation gap.
Climate Action Dashboard
The Climate Action Dashboard features key indicators to track progress towards climate objectives and provide a snapshot of country climate action. The Dashboard has four main building blocks starting with the status of greenhouse gas (GHGs) emissions. It describes their developments in activities or sectors, impacts on climate and the environment and the associated risks and vulnerabilities, the policies and actions to mitigate and adapt to climate change, and the derived socio-economic opportunities that contribute to a just transition.
Actions & opportunities
Climate actions and policies
The number and intensity of climate policies provides an indicator of effective climate action This section draws on the OECD Climate Actions and Policies Measurement Framework (CAPMF). The CAPMF is a climate change mitigation database that tracks countries’ climate action through 130 policy variables, grouped into 56 policies, across 50 countries over the 1990-2022 period. By tracking climate policies in a consistent and harmonised way, the CAPMF enables analytical work that can support countries to assess the effectiveness of their policy approaches. However, the CAPMF cannot measure effectiveness directly. It is not prescriptive; it can only describe the evolution of climate action over time and provide information about the different policy types and sectors, in which countries adopted their policies.
Targets, international co-operation, governance, and climate data
Climate targets (e.g., net-zero targets and Nationally Determined Contributions), international co-operation, governance and climate data are key enabling conditions for effective mitigation. While these climate actions may not have a direct material effect on emissions, they provide the policy framework with mid- and long-term signals for all stakeholders. They also create the institutional capacity to effectively implement policies, enable the tracking of progress, and identify key emissions drivers. Actions on international co-ordination on climate mitigation are key in view of the global nature of climate change and the unevenly distributed emissions sources and impacts.
Market-based Instruments
Market-based instruments (MBIs) refer to instruments that incentivise private actions by offering a direct economic benefit or causing changes in the prices directly associated with the regulatory base. By changing the relative prices between fossil-intense and low-carbon goods, MBIs can reduce the demand of fossil-intense goods and assets and steer consumption or production decisions towards low- or zero carbon options without mandating a specific behaviour to households and firms. MBIs can be distinguished between trading systems (for emission permits or renewable energy certificates), subsidies for low-carbon alternatives and taxes and fees, including carbon taxes.
Non-Market Based Instrument
Non-market-based instruments (nMBIs) are a group of policy instruments that seek to guide production or consumption decisions towards low-carbon alternatives through legal obligations, non-monetary incentives, enhanced information, or enabling conditions (e.g. public transport infrastructure). NMBIs are critical to mainstream advanced low-carbon technologies, provide climate-relevant information to stakeholders, steer broad, bottom-up support for climate measures, and develop infrastructure for low-carbon alternatives. They can be distinguished between regulatory standards (i.e. technology and performance standards) information instruments and other nMBIs.