Turning Global Climate Commitments into Action at COP31
As world leaders gather in Türkiye, Audubon is helping advance practical solutions that protect birds, strengthen communities, and build a more resilient future.
The world is approaching a critical turning point in the fight against climate change. The United Nations Environment Program’s (UNEP) Limiting Overshoot report makes clear that global temperature rise will exceed the 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold established under the Paris Agreement. But how far we exceed that threshold, and how quickly we take decisive action, will have profound consequences for birds, people and ecosystems. Every tenth of a degree of temperature rise increases the severity and frequency of storms, droughts, floods, biodiversity loss, and other climate impacts.
This urgency will frame discussions when global leaders gather this November in Antalya, Türkiye, for the annual United Nations climate change negotiations, known as COP31. The challenge now is not only to limit how far temperatures rise above 1.5 degrees, but also to strengthen the resilience of communities, ecosystems, and economies to the changes already underway.
COP31 is an opportunity for countries to plan ways to address these challenges. Nearly 200 participating governments will converge in Antalya to launch the second Global Stocktake (GST), a process that assesses how well the world is meeting the goals of the 2015 Paris Agreement. This global "report card" looks at where we stand on collective international goals related to climate mitigation, adaptation, and support. It is also an opportunity for leaders to capture in formal text ways to accelerate progress towards three Paris Agreement goals and even set new interim collective goals. This, in turn, can help accelerate global action towards global action. The outcomes of the first GST helped catalyze faster progress on topics like reducing emissions of methane, a superpollutant, and transitioning away from fossil fuels.
Science-based organizations like Audubon will contribute in the first phase of the two-year GST process, when technical input is collected from scientists, governments, and other stakeholders to inform a global report. That initial phase is followed by the negotiation and approval of a formal COP decision reflecting the findings. Beyond the GST, COP31 negotiations will include topics such as adaptation indicators, adaptation finance, the continuation of the Mitigation Work Program, carbon market guidance, and potential updates to guidance on Paris Agreement reporting and review.
COP31 will include a significant focus on global efforts to halt and reverse deforestation and forest degradation by 2030, as well as restoring ecosystems at scale. At last year’s COP30 in Belem, Brazil, the Brazilian government committed to developing a Forests Roadmap to advance these efforts. The Roadmap was released November 2025 by President Lula alongside a separate roadmap focused on transitioning away from fossil fuels. This new Forest Roadmap will be a focus for world leaders on November 11 at an event hosted by the Forests & Climate Leaders Partnership, which will help elevate the importance of forests to global climate efforts.
Audubon will host and participate in several events during COP31, including two on November 11 and 18 that will focus on catalyzing the global momentum needed to achieve the 2030 forests goal. Audubon will also showcase the innovative work it is doing with partners to advance climate solutions that benefit birds, people, and the planet at the scale needed to address the urgency of the climate crisis. This includes the implementation of large-scale nature-based solutions, including coastal restoration, restoration of grasslands in working landscapes, and conservation of the world’s second largest peatland. Audubon will also detail how it utilizes advanced mapping and other tools to ensure the responsible deployment of clean energy that can power communities and economies while also protecting nature. The reoccurring theme across these events and others is how Audubon’s science, policy expertise, and deep relationships with partners and communities help place the world on the path to a safer climate future.
In her forward to the new Overshoot report, UNEP Executive Director Inger Angersen noted that “this is not the future we sought,” and a return to 1.5°C is not guaranteed. “But limiting the magnitude, duration and consequences of overshoot, while preserving the possibility of bringing temperatures back down, is the best remaining option to protect vulnerable people, reduce losses and secure a livable future for all.”
The choices we make today and in the years to come can help limit warming and build a path toward a more stable climate. Audubon will continue to contribute our science, partnerships, policy expertise and implementation experience to this critical challenge – at COP31 in Antalya, and in every community and country in which we work, and invite you to join this effort.
