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greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations in the atmosphere continue to rise, even when all governmental pledges are implemented, a gap of 11-13 gigatons (Gt) of CO2eq will remain (3). Short-term state and non-state climate action can help close this gap, and is crucial to prevent more radical and costly measures,

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impacts of climate change that is already occurring are being felt around the world. These include an increasing number of extreme weather events, rising losses and damages and changing weather patterns, and also catalyse the displacement and migration of vulnerable communities (4),

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current political turbulence — for instance in the United States — and the scarcity of public resources endanger the full implementation of governmental pledges. Even a number of European countries that are fully committed to the Paris Agreement still fall short of the ambitions needed to limit global warming to well below 2 oC,

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governments set the policy framework but actions are implemented on the ground by non-state and sub-national actors, many of whom are the true leaders of innovative and effective actions, in particular the smaller, emerging, bottom-up climate actors.

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non-state actions could inform more ambitious climate policies by demonstrating to governments that more ambitious climate targets are plausible,

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non-state actions could help governments implement national-level policies and contribute to meeting national requirements under the EU’s nationally determined contribution (NDC),

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non-state actors could help to detect opportunities to strengthen the regulatory environment (6).

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The EU has been advocating multi-stakeholder International Cooperative Initiatives that address mitigation in the context of the UNFCCC.

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The EU contributed to large multi-stakeholder climate initiatives (9).

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Individual Member States have supported the international climate action agenda. For instance, France led large-scale mobilisation efforts on the road to the Paris Agreement. The Nordic countries and the Netherlands contributed to developing the Climate Initiatives Platform (currently hosted by UN Environment).

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European-based actors are leading an estimated 54 % of UNFCCC-registered cooperative initiatives for climate action (10).

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micro-enterprises, small and medium-sized enterprises, social enterprises (including cooperatives) are currently under-represented in EU-supported initiatives, as well as in the context of the UNFCCC (11),

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climate actions by rural communities and smaller and medium-sized cities are under-represented compared to those undertaken by large metropolitan cities (12).

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supportive policy/legislative environment,

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financial needs: access to public funds and fiscal incentives,

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technical support: to facilitate mutual learning, capacity-building, exchange of knowledge and good practices and to raise awareness,

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wider credibility, visibility, understanding and recognition of their contributions,

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improved collaboration among the various actors in the private and public sphere.

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it can be a first step towards including non-state actions in the implementation of national and EU-level climate policies,

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in-depth studies of particular climate actions can help in drawing up public policies and identifying regulatory obstacles, scalable solutions and the circumstances under which particular measures are effective,

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it can generate practical knowledge for non-state actors to effectively engage in climate action.

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the broad recognition of new and existing commitments through an online platform,

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opening up possibilities for emerging climate actors to feature at (high-level) events, both at European level and in the context of international negotiations,

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the awarding of prizes to particularly accomplished climate actions, for instance in specific thematic areas.

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a growing number of new non-state climate commitments. To help speed up initiatives, the dialogue — possibly in cooperation with the UNFCCC and other partners — should publicise new commitments,

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rapid uptake of solutions and lessons learned emanating from non-state climate actions at European level. To aid this acceleration the dialogue could include the organisation of regional technical expert meetings, modelled on — and feeding into — similar meetings held in UNFCCC sessions,

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the organising partners can occasionally also broker new partnerships and climate actions in particularly promising or urgent areas, using the dialogue process and their own convening power,

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sometimes sectorial or territorial initiatives may compete among themselves if the right approach to promoting collaboration is not identified and fostered. A ‘birds eye’ view is needed to identify gaps and potential collaborations and to broker new partnership.

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the provision of a network environment that is conducive to brokering new partnerships among state and non-state actors,

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the facilitation of peer learning and advice sharing among non-state actors by helping them to overcome regulatory obstacles,

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the provision of education and learning as well as stimulating innovation, e.g. through massive open online courses (MOOC), webinars and workshops on specific issues (17),

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the facilitation of access to finance, for instance, through mapping existing channels; exploring innovative financing instruments (including peer-to-peer, crowd, and micro financing); proposing simplification of fiscal rules and the creation of new financing windows — e.g. to facilitate access to private, international and multilateral funds.

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existing expert meetings of the EESC’s Sustainable Development Observatory could gain additional relevance by being connected to the UNFCCC process as ‘Technical Expert Meetings’ or thematic and regional dialogues to take stock of existing climate actions,

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the European Day of Sustainable Communities — organised by ECOLISE in cooperation with the EESC — could draw attention to local communities and recognise their contributions to climate action,

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annual events supported by the EU institutions (e.g. Green Week, EU Sustainable Energy Week, European Sustainable Development Week, etc.) could feature sessions devoted to non-state climate action.

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the mapping of funding opportunities,

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advice on fundable plans,

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analysing current dialogue and consultation procedures with non-state actors, with a view to establishing new techniques and best practices to enhance the use of existing European and international funds,

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advocating for the upcoming Multiannual Financial Framework of the EU to serve the higher climate ambitions of, and incentivise actions by, non-state actors,

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the exploration of innovative funding (peer-to-peer, crowd, micro, green bonds, etc.).

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to support the ‘assessment’ function, the initiators of the dialogue should engage with existing research groups, climate action tracking initiatives and data platforms,

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to support the ‘recognition’ function, cooperation with existing awarding initiatives should be sought, for instance UNFCCC’s Momentum for Change awards, and the SEED awards (19), EESC Civil Society Prize, etc.,

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to support the ‘improving governance’ and ‘acceleration’ functions, communication channels should be established, for instance with facilitative dialogues and technical expert processes within the UNFCCC, as well as with relevant EU and Member State level processes such as the European Environment and Sustainable Development Advisory Councils (EEAC),

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for the support function, links with existing programmes should be established. For instance, access to financing and best practices can be coordinated with the EU LIFE programme, a funding instrument for environmental and climate action, EIB grant aid or loans and/or other European programmes, while the compilation of Horizon 2020 research findings relevant to non-state practitioners can be disseminated broadly among participants to the dialogue.