Will tracking climate adaptation progress in Africa be a myth or reality? Juxtaposing Nationally Determined Contributions and the Global Goal on Adaptation Framework

The core of the 2015 Paris Agreement and accomplishment of its long-term objectives lie in the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). Adaptation commitment in the NDCs represents efforts by each country to adapt to climate impacts and address challenges posed by climate change. The Paris Agreement further established the Global Goal on Adaptation (GGA) and the GGA framework adopted at COP28 sets global targets for adaptation outcomes in key sectors and processes. As such, there is growing focus on tracking multi-scale adaptation progress. Here, we provide a contrasting overview of adaptation assessment in Africa’s NDCs and the GGA regarding aligning adaptation goals and targets, monitoring and evaluation efforts, as well as identifying best practices for measuring effective adaptation and monitoring progress made to guide planning, design, and implementation of adaptation efforts for reporting at the global level. While the GGA framework highlights targets and guides areas for adaptation action a review of the adaptation aspects of African governments’ NDCs shows a lack of precision in terms of clearly identifying vulnerabilities, priority sectors, actions taken to date, needed support, cost, and financial gaps. Such contrasts provide insights into potential challenges in tracking adaptation efforts and outcomes by governments which might jeopardize efforts to report at the global level. Considering emerging global perspectives and increasing emphasis on conducting the Global Stocktake under the Paris Agreement, possible progress in achieving the GGA, measuring adaptation effectiveness and metrics, we suggest ways to systematically monitor and report adaptation actions to ensure both NDCs and GGA are achieving their stated objectives and contributing to effective climate adaptation across climate research, policy, and investment.