Water for Climate and Finance: Key Takeaways from COP29 in Baku

COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, concluded on November 22. Often referred to as the "Finance COP," this conference also placed a strong emphasis on water issues. We’ve gathered the key highlights from COP29 that focus on the intersection of water and climate.

29 November 2024 - The climate crisis is most acutely affecting water resources. WMO’s State of Global Water Resources reports show that the water cycle is spinning out of control and becoming more erratic, unpredictable, and extreme.

CLIMATE & WATER

Climate change is expected to lead to more frequent incidents of water pollution, salinization, and eutrophication, driven by increased droughts, floods, sea level rise, and rising water temperatures in certain rivers and lakes. The Baltic Sea, with its relatively small water volume and slow exchange of water with the North Atlantic, is particularly vulnerable. These conditions amplify the impact of climate change, causing many processes and interactions to occur more rapidly than in other seas. To learn more about the effects of climate change in the Baltic Sea in the latest update of HELCOM Baltic Sea Climate Change Fact Sheet.

At COP29, the most significant and expected event has been the adoption of the Declaration on Water for Climate Action. The Declaration commits to applying comprehensive approaches to combating the causes and consequences of climate change for water basins, paving the way for increased regional and international cooperation. Nearly 50 countries joined the adoption of the Declaration, it was approved by prominent non-state actors, including WWF, Water.org & Water Equity, Stockholm International Water Institute and the Islamic Development Bank.

It also emphasizes the need to integrate water-related mitigation and adaptation measures into national climate policies, including Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and National Adaptation Plans (NAPs). To support this, signatories will collaborate to enhance the generation of scientific knowledge on the causes and impacts of climate change on water resources and basins. This will include efforts to share data and develop new climate scenarios at the basin level.

To support the implementation of these actions Baku Dialogue on Water for Climate Action was launched with high-level representatives from the European Union, Finland, Gambia, Germany, Moldova, the Netherlands, Slovenia, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States. This initiative will serve as a collaboration platform between COPs, promoting continuity and coherence in water-related climate actions. It will ensure a sustained focus on water and its connections to climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution, and desertification, with an emphasis on actions at the international, regional, river, and basin levels.

Commenting on the Water for Climate Action launch, COP29 President Mukhtar Babayev said: “Water is the link that flows between the climate, biodiversity and desertification crises. By enhancing collaboration between countries and between COPs, the Water for Climate Action initiative will allow us to act on all three fronts”.

From the point of view of water resources, COP29 is an important milestone, an official recognition at a high level that water resources are an integral part of the global climate agenda. The necessity of integrating water management and transboundary cooperation into national climate policy, such as Nationally Determined Contributions and National Adaptation Plans, is not something new, but obviously crucial for effective climate adaptation and mitigation. We will be able to see the first results of this process next year. Parties will provide updates to their own NDCs and NAPs by February 2025 so COP29 is an important moment in making the case for water’s role in these key documents.

CLIMATE & FINANCE

One of the main results of COP29 was the approval of the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) - the target of $300 billion per year by 2035 annually by developed countries to combat climate change in developing countries. This result falls short of what developing countries would hope for at the end of a long negotiation process, and does not meet their real needs considering the scale of the observed impacts of global climate change and the speed of ongoing climate shifts. On the other hand, the call in the final document to jointly create conditions for increasing climate financing for developing countries from all sources to at least $1.3 trillion per year by 2035 seems to leave the door open and maintains hope for a qualitatively higher level of ambition in this critical area. However, it also hints that large sums of money will not simply fall from the sky and that all stakeholders and countries will need to work hard to attract such funds and elevate climate finance to a new level.

OUTCOMES

Overall, climatologists and activists worldwide expressed dissatisfaction with the recent conference. They felt the issues facing Pacific island nations were not adequately addressed, the financial commitments were insufficient, and the outcomes of the conference were, in the words of Shailendra Yashwant, Senior Advisor at Climate Action Network South Asia: "not just a failure, but a betrayal" of developing countries.

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Article written by Anna Ushakova, CCB Maritime Working Area Leader

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Tampering with EU Fisheries Policy would ‘open Pandora’s Box’, NGOs warn

By CCB • March 30, 2026

Brussels, 30 March 2026 - Today, Fisheries Ministers from EU Member States meet with the European Commission for the AGRIFISH Council. On this occasion, Oceana, BLOOM, ClientEarth, Coalition Clean Baltic (CCB), Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), Seas At Risk and WWF EU, handed a symbolic ''Pandora’s Box'' to the EU Commissioner Costas Kadis, sending a clear message as the European Commission prepares its 2026 evaluation of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). The box represents the risks of revising EU’s main fishery policy framework: once opened, competing demands from Member States, industry, small-scale fishers, and coastal communities could quickly spiral into division, regulatory delays and uncertainties. This would put at risk the hard-won progress made in restoring Europe’s fish populations and improving the profitability of the fishing sector. NGOs urge decision makers to build on the progress made to date and to prioritise the full and timely implementation of the existing rules. Reopening the CFP and its related provisions would undermine ocean health and the long-term future of Europe’s fishing communities. '' Europe's fisheries policy is facing a credibility test. The law is already there. The tools to rebuild our seas already exist. What's missing is the political will to deliver. Overfishing should have ended by 2020 at the latest. Reopening the CFP would signal that missed deadlines carry no consequences, erode trust, revert the progress made, and put the future of our fisheries and coastal communities at stake ’’, said the NGO coalition. *** Oceana: Vera Coelho, Executive Director and Vice President in Europe BLOOM: Claire Nouvian, Founder and General Director ClientEarth: John Condon, Lead of Marine Ecosystems Coalition Clean Baltic (CCB): Ida Carlén, Co-Chair Environmental Justice Foundation: Steve Trent, CEO/Founder Seas At Risk: Dr Monica Verbeek, Executive Director WWF EU: Ester Asin, Director

CCB´s submission to the EU Call for Evidence on the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD)

By CCB • March 10, 2026

Uppsala, March 2026 - CCB has closely worked with the implementation of the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) ever since its adoption and welcomed the opportunity to give feedback to this crucial directive for marine biodiversity and ocean health through the EU Call of Evidence . Evaluations conducted by the EU Commission previously found many positive effects for EU marine waters stemming from the directive, but also that the directive has some shortcomings. CCB however, maintains that the largest obstacle to fully implementing the directive and achieving Good Environmental Status (GES) is the lack of political will among Member States to do so. This forthcoming revision must therefore result in a framework directive that is more easily enforceable, measurable and implementable, accompanied by sufficient funding to carry out the measures. Furthermore, in order to achieve GES as fast as possible other key pieces of EU legislation must also support reaching it and focus on achieving the goals of the MSFD in their objectives. Seeing that European seas generally are in poor condition and under mounting pressure from human activities and that in the Baltic Sea the situation is especially dire there is an urgent need for truly ecosystem-based management of our seas and for reaching GES. The revised MSFD can help us achieve this, but only if it includes the points outlined below and the directive is fully and swiftly implemented: *** [Short version]*** Operationalise the overarching GES goal: EU sea areas were supposed to reach GES already in 2020, but due to low political ambition, sadly did not do so. Member States should therefore strive to reach GES as fast as possible now. Setting a new overall deadline for when to reach GES is not the answer on how to achieve this goal most efficiently, instead tools that address pressures and measure progress and ensure actual, timely implementation of ambitious measures must be included in the revised directive in order to operationalise achieving the overall GES goal. CCB therefore recommends making the existing and forthcoming threshold values for the descriptors and their criteria legally binding and part of the main directive. Improving regional coordination and implementation: To improve the coherence, coordination and effectiveness of MSFD implementation, assessment of GES, monitoring and the national PoMs the role of the Regional Seas Conventions (RSCs) must be clarified. CCB would welcome collating all the national PoMs into one regional PoM for the Baltic Sea, which should be aligned with, in addition to reaching the goals of the MSFD, with achieving the goals of the Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP). Land-sea interface: For the Baltic Sea to achieve GES it is key that land-based pressures, primarily nutrient runoff from agriculture causing severe eutrophication, is also addressed and that implementation of the MSFD goes hand in hand with the implementation of the Water Framework Directive (WFD). The goals of the MSFD and achieving GES should also be included when implementing and shaping the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), as well as any synergies with implementing the EU Zero Pollution Action Plan which are also important to identify and utilise. The Baltic Sea also has a too high prevalence and level of other pollutants and hazardous substances affecting marine life. Fisheries and aquaculture: As one of the main pressure factors on the marine environment in general, as well as in the Baltic Sea, fisheries and aquaculture and the effects they have on the marine ecosystem and its biodiversity must be addressed in order to achieve GES. This is especially crucial when considering the MSFD descriptor for Biodiversity (D1), Fish and Shellfish (D3), Food webs (D4) and the one for Seabed integrity (D6). Climate change: Climate change is also affecting the Baltic Sea faster than other marine regions and must be factored in when managing the sea area and its resources to ensure EBM and the full implementation of the MSFD and achieving GES. The effects of the climate crisis should be accounted for when setting pressure reduction targets and threshold values for the descriptors and their criteria, in a way that when an effect cannot be measured nor predicted the precautionary principle must be used. Revising Art. 14 of the MSFD: Article 14 in the MSFD outlines the acceptable exceptions when reaching GES is not possible. The article needs to be revised in the forthcoming revision, since it contains too many and too broad in scope possibilities for exemptions (e.g. in Art. 14(4)), which jeopardise the implementation and fulfilment of the directive as a whole. A possible way of modifying it would be to introduce an obligation for Member States to demonstrate that they have taken all measures within their control nationally and that they have tried to address the problem and advance solving it on a regional level through cooperating with other Member States, before they can apply for a possible exemption. Make the Programme of Measures contain ambitious & concrete measures: One of the cornerstones of the MSFD is the national PoMs that are published every six years and are precluded by an assessment of GES in national waters and a monitoring programme. Unfortunately, the current approach to PoMs where Member States freely can choose measures has led to an overall too low level of ambition in the PoMs, and to large differences within regions and between neighboring countries in terms of which measures are included. In order to fully implement the directive and to achieve GES it is of paramount importance that the national PoMs have a high level of ambition and contain concrete, implementable measures and that there is regional coordination. Easing the reporting burden: One of the results from the evaluation of the MSFD was that the current reporting burden is considered to be too high and a possible way to address this is to align the reporting obligations of the MSFD to more reassemble those of the WFD, that has a more simplified 6-year cycle compared to the MSFD. The implementation cycle however should not be revised or at least not in a way that delays reaching GES. Improve coherence with other legislation: To ensure that the revised MSFD is fully implemented it is essential that coherence with other relevant legislation is improved. The MSPD (foundation for the forthcoming Ocean Act) is also currently being revised and to reach the goals for both the directives achieving GES needs to be a cornerstone of the Ocean Act. This is the only way to deliver truly ecosystem-based management of our seas, and the revision of both directives should therefore be coordinated and focused on achieving GES. CCB looks forward to continuing to provide input to the revision process of the MSFD as well as working with the implementation of the MSFD, especially in the Baltic Sea. CCB expects that the revision will result in a more enforceable directive that leads to the fast implementation of ambitious measures to improve the state of the Baltic and European Sea areas and to the achievement of GES. The full text of the submission is available here . *** Links to supplemental documents supporting our positions: CCB’s submission to the Call for Evidence for the Ocean Act Guiding Recommendations for Source-to-Sea Restoration in Riverine, Coastal, and Marine Ecosystems (Coalition Clean Baltic, 2025) Position Paper on Marine Protected Areas (Coalition Clean Baltic 2024) Don’t sink the Common Fisheries Policy – fulfil its potential (joint NGO Briefing 2025) Blue Manifesto (joint NGO paper)