Chilean society builds its Long-Term Climate Strategy in a participatory way

Chile once again demonstrates its leadership on climate action with a formal presentation of its Long Term Climate Strategy (LTS) at the World Climate Conference (COP26) in Glasgow.  It thus, defines the route that the country will take to reach the goal of being carbon neutral and resilient by 2050 at the latest, a goal also established in the draft framework law on climate change, currently under constitutional discussion within Congress.

 

The long-term strategy seeks all territories and sectors of the economy to incorporate concrete measures against climate change in the medium and long term, as well as the deployment of a collective and economy-wide effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions consistent with the goals of the Paris Agreement.

 

However, the task is daunting: to reach the maximum amount of national emissions budget by 2030 of 1.1 billion tons of carbon, determined under the Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) and present in the Long-Term Strategy, Chile has established cumulative emissions limits (or carbon budgets) by sector.

To ensure compliance with this ambitious goal, the allocation of greenhouse emissions by sector contemplates the abilities of each line Ministry to achieve the required actions and the cost-effectiveness of such initiatives.  Thus, the allocation contemplates that 29% of total emissions between 2020 and 2030 will correspond to the Transport sector, 26% to the Energy sector, 16% to the Mining sector (16%), 11% to the Agriculture sector, 9% to the Housing sector (9%), 5% to the Health sector, and 4% to the Public Works sector.

How can these objectives be met successfully? The key lies in the whole of society  

With the support of the NDC Support Facility, the World Bank supported Chile during its COP25 presidency financing several technical assistance projects , such as the participatory process for the Long-Term Climate Strategy and the ambitious update of the Nationally Determined Contribution, among others.

The country showed great social leadership in developing a broad and inclusive participatory process for the elaboration of the strategy and the definition of long-term sectoral objectives and targets for 14 key sectors of the economy, defined in the draft Climate Change Law.

The process included early participation followed by a formal participation and strengthening stage. The World Bank supported the design, implementation, and analysis of the early participation inputs that brought together close to 2,000 experts at the national level, who contributed to the identification of long-term objectives and goals on which the strategy proposal was designed and based. Following the initial drafting, the strategy was resubmitted to a new citizen consultation.

Following the participatory process, the strategy was approved by the Council of Ministers for Sustainability and presented to the secretariat of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) on November 3 at COP 26. In total, the strategy establishes 407 short, medium, and long-term goals, including commitments to have a 100% renewable electricity generation matrix by 2050, to reduce emissions from the industrial and mining sectors by 70%, and to protect 100,000 hectares of urban wetlands.

One of the main objectives of the early participatory process was to create a sense of ownership of the vision of clean and resilient development in the future, and to socialize the development goals with the entire Chilean population since the commitment will have to be assumed by all the country's inhabitants.

For this reason, the inclusive participation of stakeholders from the public and private sectors, academia, and civil society was ensured, incorporating the representation of regional actors and young people, and the presence of indigenous communities, representatives of remote and backward areas, and the consideration of gender equity. The participatory processes included specific discussions with key ministries responsible for the economic sectors and advisers from the Scientific Committee and Advisory Council to the Chilean Presidency for COP25.

New opportunities and the advantages of a virtual world

Due to the pandemic, the early participatory process was carried out virtually, which provided an opportunity to facilitate greater regional and community participation and to integrate the different territorial and social realities into the same discussion.

The process also emphasized the importance of strengthening the participation of civil society in the discussion of the impacts and opportunities of climate actions to all sectors of society. This also included the identification of targeted training and differentiated support to access technologies for communication with representatives of different rural communities without internet access.

Through the participatory process, Chile demonstrated that to advance towards sustainable and inclusive development, it must contemplate early participatory processes and the co-creation of public policy design.  This includes listening to diverse and varied perspectives and ensuring the collection of opinions on how to integrate climate challenges into development pathways for different sectors of society.

 

The World Bank is proud to have contributed to one of the first climate strategies in Latin America and the Caribbean, which sets out concrete and detailed steps at the sectoral level. The strategy represents an important tool for local and national development planning that integrates the costs and needs of an entire economy, as well as identifying opportunities for growth in line with a low-emission and highly resilient future.

To help more countries, the World Bank recently launched a multi-country program to support the development of country-specific long-term strategies to achieve decarbonization and resilience through 2050 . Going forward, the World Bank will play an even greater role in supporting countries' NDCs and the development of long-term strategies, as defined in its new Climate Change Action Plan. It is committed more than ever to working with its partners, and to developing and implementing high-impact instruments, to achieve a post-COVID19 recovery that is green, resilient, inclusive, people-centered, and ensures a sustainable future.