Delegates attending the Bonn Climate Change Conference - April 2018

The 2019 Bonn Climate Change Conference marks the beginning of a transition in climate change governance, from negotiation to implementation. At this technical meeting, delegates will discuss issues mostly related to implementation, with only a few issues remaining left that require negotiations for new rules. With the Paris Agreement adopted and the Katowice Climate Package – a set of guidelines that, together, form a kind of rule book or user’s manual to the Paris Agreement – complete, delegates will focus on the implementation of existing commitments related to the Kyoto Protocol and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). For more on the negotiations and outcomes of the Katowice Climate Change Conference, see the Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB) summary and analysis. The outcomes of this meeting will be forwarded to the UN Climate Change Conference in Santiago, Chile, in December 2019.

There are two areas of unfinished business related to the Paris Agreement:

• the “Article 6” negotiations for market and non-market based approaches, and for “internationally transferrable mitigation outcomes (ITMOs), which is a mechanism for developed countries to support other countries in reducing emissions, then applying the resulting credits to its own emissions reduction target; and
• “common timeframes” to enable parties to submit pledges, called nationally determined contributions (NDCs), that have the same schedule, in terms of their start and end dates, to make it easier to compare parties’ efforts.

At stake is climate ambition, which is higher on the agenda than ever before, after the stark findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on 1.5°C of Global Warming. Market mechanisms can undercut climate action by reducing emissions in the sectors and countries where it is easiest and least cost, or, when designed properly, they can provide incentives for financing climate projects that otherwise would not happen, and can help reduce overall costs to allow countries to set more ambitious targets. Shorter timeframes allow for more regular assessments and increases in the ambition of countries’ NDCs. Longer timeframes, others point out, allow more time for domestic planning, which could help lock-in ambitious climate action.

The implementation-related discussions will be technical and focused include most of the major areas of international climate change policy: mitigation, adaptation, loss and damage, and transparency. The 50th session of the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technical Advice (SBSTA) will consider methodological issues under the Convention, Kyoto Protocol and Paris Agreement, such as common reporting formats. SBSTA will also renew discussion of the IPCC Special Report on 1.5°C of Global Warming, after parties failed to agree whether to “welcome” or “note” the report in Katowice in 2018.

The 50th session of the Subsidiary Body for Implementation (SBI) will take up several issues, including arrangements for the next Conference of the Parties (COP) meeting in Chile. SBI will also initiate the second review of the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage associated with Climate Change Impacts.

Several workshops will convene to allow countries to discuss some issues in detail. On agriculture, participants will discuss improved livestock management systems, including agropastoral production system, and socioeconomic and food security dimensions of climate change in the agricultural sector.

The Bonn Climate Change Conference takes place at the World Conference Center Bonn, Germany from 17-27 June 2019.