World Government officials, diplomats, climate experts, NGOs, and other stakeholders gathered at the 2025 Bonn Climate Conference to discuss and negotiate ways of addressing and financing the problems caused by climate change.
The agenda of the meeting attended by more than 5,000 participants in June featured critical subjects such as climate adaptation, CO2 emissions, and the loss and damage caused by natural disasters. However, the most important question that remained was how to identify sustainable ways of funding the staggering level of climate finance required, with current estimations suggesting that between US$6.2 and US$7.4 trillion will be needed annually from now until 2050 to achieve the net-zero emission goal.
Yet only US$1.46 trillion of climate finance was tracked in 2022.
With such apparently slow progress on fundraising, together with diminishing political support for climate action and reduced aid budgets, how relevant is the yearly Bonn Climate Conference? This article examines this topic, addresses the essential questions, and defines the Green Climate Fund, the Loss and Damage Fund, and the New Collective Quantified Goal on Climate Finance.
What does the Bonn Climate Conference entail?
As an annual mid-year summit, the Bonn Climate Conference is formally known as the Session of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Subsidiary Bodies (SBs). During the sessions, UNFCCC member states reflect and negotiate on the technicalities of matters arising at the annual Conferences of the Parties. The negotiations have a massive impact on the final outcomes agreed by the parties at the COP. This is of particular interest for the not-so-wealthy developing nations, with the technical work undertaken being crucial to translate high-level commitments into actionable policies and measures.
It is a fact that developing nations are the most affected by global warming and the changing climate, despite emitting the least greenhouse gases. The Bonn Climate Conference is therefore a valuable platform for emerging economies to mobilize for more climate finance due to their vulnerability to climate change and to negotiate pledges and agree on replenishments to support global climate finance.
During the conference, parties give new pledges, secure more contributions, and assess to what extent commitments have been honored. Two of the most important funding instruments in this regard are the Green Climate Fund (GCF) and the Loss and Damage Fund (LDF).
The 2025 Bonn Climate Conference was particularly significant as it served as final preparation for the November 2025 COP30 in Brazil, which marks the 10th anniversary of the Paris Agreement. Brazil’s presidency emphasizes the “spirit of Mutirão” – an approach that focuses on collective action and resource pooling and recognizes that climate action requires broad collaboration beyond just financial transfers.
Why more climate finance in developing nations?
According to the Climate Adaptation Finance Gap report, the cost of developing countries’ adaptation to changing climate conditions is approximately between US$215B and US$387B per year. However, the flow of funds from top donors and developed nations is less than US$30 billion per year, and this amount is expected to decrease following the withdrawal of the U.S. from the Paris Agreement (Fig. 1).
Figure 1: Approximate U.S. Climate Finance Overseen by USAID in FY 2022-2023
Source: Reccessary
Other major donor nations such as the UK, the Netherlands, Canada, and France are also reallocating aid funds to other sectors (i.e., defense), thus following the U.S. example. As a result, the cuts in aid for climate change programs are causing funding gaps in developing nations, necessitating a focus on mobilizing fair climate finance.
Yet bad weather events, heatwaves, droughts, and other climate issues do not wait for donors, which is leading to more and more economic and social damage. According to the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies 2024 Report, extreme weather events related to climate change caused almost 8 million displacements in Africa. Meanwhile, heatwaves are taking lives in Europe and at the same time causing wildfires that affect tourism and biodiversity.
The Bonn Climate Conference as a platform for climate finance negotiations
The Bonn summit is an important avenue to negotiate, mobilize, and assess climate finance pledges. Climate finance topped the negotiations at the 2024 and 2025 conferences when the parties discussed the funding evolution of the GCF, the LDF, and other climate finance instruments.
Bridging the climate finance gap via the GCF
The GCF is the world’s largest climate fund source, established under the Paris Agreement and UNFCCC, to support nations to achieve greater climate resilience and prosperity. During the Bonn summits, states negotiate, pledge, and agree to replenish the GCF to establish fair funding to support climate change. At the 2023 Bonn Conference, 25 donor nations pledged at least US$9.3 billion for the Fund’s second replenishment period (2024-2027). Six more nations committed at least US$3.5 billion during COP28, raising the total pledges close to US$13 billion.
Also, according to the 2025 Climate Fund report, at the 2024 Bonn Conference, 35 states pledged almost US$14 billion for the Fund’s second replenishment and, by January 2025, at least 70% of those commitments had been confirmed. Securing more than half of the pledged funds in FY2024 indicates that the Bonn Climate Conference is an effective approach to support climate financing in the developing world.
Climate financing via the LDF
Adopted at the COP28 in November 2023, the LDF is a climate finance mechanism that provides grants and financial assistance to developing nations recovering after disasters. During the COP28, donor countries such as France, Italy, the UK, and others pledged nearly US$661 million as initial commitments for the Fund’s operationalization. As of April 2025, the aggregate pledges for the Fund had surged to almost US$768 million, but donor governments had only disbursed US$321 million to the Fund.
Notable impacts of the LDF are:
- Malawi’s Cyclone Freddy Response: In 2023, the LDF provided cash transfers of US$750 to each of the 633 cyclone-hit families in the Nsanje district of Malawi, which enabled households to cover the losses and damage caused by the weather event.
- Reducing Cyclone Risks in Bangladesh: In 2024, the LDF, in collaboration with NGOs, provided funds for the construction of roads and the building of education centers that also operate as cyclone shelters in Bangladesh.
Future goal of bridging climate finance gaps in Bonn
The 2024 COP29 marked the adoption of a new climate financing roadmap – the New Collective Quantified Goal on Climate Finance (NCQG). This is a framework to mobilize roughly US$300 billion yearly from developed nations and to increase public and private climate finance to at least US$1.3 trillion annually by 2035. At the 2025 Bonn Climate Conference, discussions about the NCQG framework took center stage as part of the climate finance theme.
Wrap Up
Despite the cuts to climate action aid characterized by the dismantling of USAID and budget reallocations, the Bonn Climate Conference remains an invaluable platform for reducing funding gaps. During this summit, donors offer pledges and the parties negotiate climate financing through the GCF and the LDF. Developing nations and donor nations discuss the urgent need to honor pledges and expand grant-based aid to support the developing world. By setting climate finance goals and tracking the progress of the pledges made, the Bonn summit is playing an important role in bridging climate fund gaps.
At the same time, trust, communication, and transparency are fundamental enabling factors for international cooperation in the climate sector, according to researchers. The yearly Bonn conference represents an official forum to build these essential diplomatic relationships, offering space for more considered dialogue and relationship-building among the negotiators.
