Ensuring science-based climate action: Analysis of multi-stakeholder engagement in Nationally Determined Contributions

Good environmental governance includes participatory, transparent and accountable decision-making. All sectors of society have an essential role in organizing climate action towards our shared future. Networking science into decision-making will allow us to build actionable resilience intelligence. Developed in 1992, Article 6 of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Principle 10 of the Rio Convention, and the Article 12 of the 2015 Paris Agreement include specific mandates for public participation and engagement in climate actions. Governments have pledged, in international agreements, to broader public participation in environmental policy design processes facilitating access to information. Here we show how Latin-American countries are doing in regard to such responsibility by focusing on the reference to participatory processes and the inclusion in climate strategies of adequate instruments of participation in the contributions presented to the United Nations. This analysis provides a baseline from which we can ground truth and track progress of NDCs’ accelerating climate-smart future through stakeholder engagement. Our research shows there is a need for understanding and metrics for quality public participation and articulation of participatory processes