New Delhi: With less than a month to go for COP30 in Brazil, policymakers, financial institutions, and climate experts convened in New Delhi for a High-Level Roundtable on Adaptation Finance, organised by Climate Trends, to discuss aligning funding with the needs of developing nations.

The closed-door meeting brought together senior officials from the Ministries of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Finance, global development banks, think tanks, and academia. Discussions focused on operationalising the Global Goal on Adaptation (GGA), assessing India's adaptation finance gaps, and exploring reforms to ensure fair, accessible, and adequate climate funding.

Participants highlighted India's vulnerability to extreme heat, erratic monsoon, floods, and agricultural losses, noting that while international adaptation finance rose from USD 22 billion to USD 28 billion in 2022, India's actual requirement exceeds USD 350 billion annually, with over 60% currently provided as loans.

Two sessions addressed policy and financing perspectives. Experts stressed integrating adaptation into profitable markets to attract private investment, strengthening subnational access to climate finance, and ensuring state and district-level planning. Ashish Chaturvedi of UNDP emphasised the need to prioritise adaptation through domestic capacities, while Amrita Goldar of ICRIER called for public finance leadership, given the niche nature of adaptation technologies.

The dialogue concluded that India's leadership, via data-driven planning, inclusive policies, and regional cooperation, could help bridge North-South divides and shape global adaptation finance architecture. The outcomes will feed into India's first official National Adaptation Plan, which will be submitted to the UNFCCC ahead of COP30.

Key themes included adaptation finance gaps across sectors, MDB reform, private sector innovation, subnational financing capacity, regional resilience cooperation, and measures to improve access to finance.