During the first two weeks of November, the world's attention will be focused on Türkiye. Antalya will host the 31st Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP31), the world's most important global summit for the future of the planet, bringing together thousands of delegates and stakeholders from heads of state and NGOs to academics and business representatives.
The planet needs more than people simply coming together. As the climate-change hourglass runs faster, its effects on daily life are intensifying. This is why, particularly over the past two COP summits, consultation, meetings, negotiation, assessment, intentions and targets have increasingly given way to practice, mobilisation, transformation, action and, above all, implementation. This process will continue at COP31, with tangible climate-action outcomes placed at the forefront.
What will the COP31 Action Agenda contain? Its ten principal areas will be addressed through three overarching strategies: implementing climate commitments, building resilience to climate change and accelerating the low-carbon transition.
Zero Waste is expected to be one of the defining agenda items at this year's summit. Waste is a vital issue because it is the third-largest source of human-caused methane emissions and is responsible for approximately 30% of the global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution. COP31 will therefore focus on tangible steps that unlock the climate-action potential of waste management through circular-economy solutions.
Integrating opportunities to reduce methane emissions from waste into updates of nationally determined contributions (NDCs) is likely to be one of the most important goals in this area.
Moving from Planning to Implementation Is Essential
To accelerate the conversion of national climate commitments into tangible implementation, the Turkish COP31 Presidency has developed a new initiative called the Climate Implementation Bridge (CIB). The CIB Action Agenda aims to address implementation barriers by strengthening connections between countries' national climate priorities, investment opportunities and financing partners.
It is expected to make it easier for countries to move their climate plans into implementation.
Clean energy transition is another COP31 Action Agenda area. Under the objective of clean, secure and affordable energy for all, it aims to improve energy access while ensuring energy reliability.
Key elements will include strengthening electricity-grid infrastructure, energy-storage systems and grid-flexibility mechanisms, developing electrification pathways and supporting energy-transition approaches that reflect each country's national circumstances.
Support Is Essential for Industrial Transformation
Cities are among the largest sources of human-caused climate change, producing approximately 70% of global greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, around 15% of major cities are exposed to both flood risk and extreme heat.
COP31 will therefore prioritise reducing emissions from buildings, expanding low-carbon solutions and energy efficiency, and creating climate-resilient cities by supporting systems and investment that encourage broad adoption of resilient infrastructure and building standards.
Industrial transformation is another major agenda area because industry accounts for approximately 25% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Green transformation in industry, the sector in which emissions are most difficult to reduce, requires highly complex processes.
Recognising that many developing countries need support to establish the foundations of green industry from the outset, COP31 will promote cooperation and the development of practical mechanisms for an inclusive industrial transition.
Food Security and Health Systems Resilient to Shocks Are Needed
Another item under the resilience strategy is the development of dynamic and resilient health systems. The extreme heat that affected Europe this summer alone demonstrates the importance of this agenda. Climate change is increasing health risks across an ever-wider range.
Priorities are therefore likely to include incorporating climate-risk assessments and integrated health-surveillance systems into national health planning and governance, and expanding multi-hazard early-warning and response systems for climate-sensitive diseases and extreme weather events.
Food security, one of humanity's fundamental challenges, is another important COP31 Action Agenda item. Under this heading, the summit will seek solutions to the severe food insecurity faced by approximately 318 million people as a result of climate-related disasters. COP31 will prioritise strengthening the food-water-climate nexus and developing climate-resilient agricultural systems.
Protecting oceans and seas, which absorb approximately 25% of human-caused carbon dioxide and form a critical line of defence against climate change, is another COP31 priority.
The aim is to increase and accelerate ocean action through priorities such as integrating the blue economy into national climate strategies, creating frameworks to strengthen the resilience of coastal and marine ecosystems, and supporting the climate resilience of coastal communities.
The Three Major Rio Conventions Will Be Addressed Holistically
COP31 will also bring climate change, desertification and land degradation, and biodiversity loss into the Action Agenda as interconnected challenges that must be addressed together. The 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro produced three vital international environmental conventions.
These - the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Convention on Biological Diversity and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification - were treated separately for many years.
COP31 will address them holistically through an Action Agenda area called Rio Synergy. Priority actions will include combating wildfires and restoring ecosystems after fires, protecting carbon sinks, promoting sustainable land management and making biodiversity an integral part of climate-adaptation policy.
Mechanisms designed to strengthen coordination among the three Rio Conventions are therefore expected to serve a highly practical and enabling function.
The final and equally important agenda area in Antalya will be youth and climate-change education. With approximately 1.8 billion people aged 10 to 24 worldwide, viewing young people not only as inheritors of climate risks, but also as architects of solutions, is crucial to the future.
COP31 will therefore prioritise strengthening climate literacy, supporting capacity-building aligned with development of the green workforce and creating dialogue mechanisms that bring relevant stakeholders together.
The Action Agenda has clearly been prepared with care. Yet whether all its areas translate into action, and whether existing action and transformation accelerate, will depend on the effectiveness of the COP31 negotiations and governments' willingness to act. Perhaps, after Antalya, the world will be able to look to the future with greater hope.
Date: 8 July 2026
