A very significant number of persons with disabilities are impacted by climate change, but they are not included in key conversations and actions on climate.
The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change highlights that approximately 3.3 to 3.6 billion people, which amounts to over half the world’s population, live in contexts that are highly vulnerable to climate change. Persons with disabilities are among these affected populations, but they are not visible in national climate adaptation plans and policies.
Those most impacted by climate change should be at the decision-making tables.
Bringing Inclusive Climate Action to COP27:
CBM Global and our partners will promote and offer practical suggestions for how climate adaptation, loss and damage and resilience can be more inclusive.
-
We will bring evidence. On 10 November, we will launch our latest research “Missing in Climate Action: Stories of persons with disabilities from the Global South”. At the same time, we will co-lead a side event “From Exclusion to Leadership: People with Disabilities Develop an Agenda for Inclusive Climate Action”.
-
We will partner with global and regional organisations of persons with disabilities (OPDs) and people with disabilities from the global south. We plan to raise awareness and influence key decision makers at COP27 on the importance of disability inclusive climate action.
-
We will support the advocacy agenda of climate and human rights networks that we are members of. These include the Climate Action Network (CAN) International and the Climate Change and Human Rights Working Group of the Centre for International Environmental Law.


COP27 Side Event
Join “From Exclusion to Leadership: People with Disabilities Develop an Agenda for Inclusive Climate Action”
Date: 10 November
Time: 18:30-20:00 UTC+2
Venue: Room 8
We will present recent evidence and recommend measures to make sure that people with disabilities and their representative organisations are at the front and centre of a rights-based response to climate change.
Speakers and topics:
- Representatives of the Finnish and Australian COP27 delegations
- Recent report analysing all Nationally Determined Contributions and national adaptation and mitigation policies from disability inclusion perspective, as well as evidence collected from the Pacific region, Australia, Bangladesh, and Madagascar
- Interventions by Ian Fry, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Climate Change, and Gerard Quinn, UN Special Rapporteur on Disability Rights