COP31 opens in Antalya with a Health Day; India seeks a climate finance decision and no new top-down targets

The UN climate conference, COP31, opens in Antalya, Türkiye, on Monday, 9 November, and its first day is given over to health. The COP31 Presidency put the Health Day together with help from the World Health Organization (WHO), which set out the plan in a release on Friday, 6 November.

Ministers, delegations, experts and civil society groups will attend four high-level panels and a ministerial roundtable. Topics range from digital health and climate-sensitive health technology to resilient health systems, humanitarian aid and funding for climate and health work.

The Presidency also launches the Antalya Initiative for Health Resilience (AIR) on Monday. WHO describes it as voluntary and non-binding: countries pool case studies on protecting health from climate risks, and the Alliance for Transformative Action on Climate and Health (ATACH) carries that work forward after Antalya.

60-plus events, 12 thematic days

WHO plans more than 60 events in the COP31 Health Pavilion and will back work on each of the 12 thematic days of the two-week meeting. It says about 3.5 billion people live with high vulnerability to climate change, and that air pollution, fossil fuel burning included, causes around 7 million deaths worldwide. A WHO analysis on 4 November put the gain from acting on six priorities at 1.6 million lives saved each year, with US$24 back on every dollar.

Where India stands

Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav set out India’s priorities in New Delhi on Tuesday, 3 November. He said India would seek a COP31 decision to start the Climate Finance Work Programme, and that developed countries are bound to provide climate finance, mostly public, concessional and predictable. Mitigation and the Global Stocktake, his ministry said, should stay Party-driven, with no new targets handed down from above.

The ministry added that voluntary initiatives on the Presidency’s Action Agenda should be kept apart from the negotiations. Uniform global targets, it said, have to take account of national circumstances. Telugu Scope reported on 4 November that India had yet to decide on Türkiye’s ’35 by 2035′ goal, under which electricity would meet 35 per cent of global energy needs by 2035.

ATACH members gather at the Health Pavilion for a full day on Tuesday, 10 November. The ministry has said the talks close on Friday, 20 November.