Developing a framework for assessing equity in national contributions to the global goal on adaptation

According to Article 14 of the Paris Agreement, the global stocktake (GST) aims to assess collective progress on the long-term goals of the agreement and will be undertaken considering equity and the best available science. While “fair share” frameworks have been suggested to assess equity in responsibility for mitigation, there is less clarity on how equity can be assessed in contributions to the global goal on adaptation (GGA). Assessing equity in the GGA requires recognising the inherent injustice of climate change, where those least responsible are often most affected by its adverse impacts, as well as addressing the complexity in scale where adaptation actions occur on the local level, but the GGA is a collective goal. Grounded on the results of a narrative and systematic review of existing metrics, this paper proposes a novel rubric-based adaptation equity framework (AEF) that assesses equity in national contributions to the GGA, as part of the GST and is founded on four equity principles: distributive, procedural, recognitional, and intergenerational justice. The AEF is applied to the South African National Climate Change Adaptation Strategy (NCCAS) to test its applicability to a specific national contribution to the GGA and to inform the AEF’s effectiveness as part of the GST. The AEF rubrics are accompanied by a summary diagram which demonstrates that South Africa’s NCCAS is strongest in its mainstreaming of distributive justice, requires greater comprehensiveness in the procedural and recognitional justice dimensions, and fails to achieve equity in intergenerational justice.