“With the times we are living in now, every year is worse” Frontline community views on climate impacts, priorities and opportunities

This paper shares evidence from across communities in fragile and conflict-affected contexts setting out how climate change is affecting their lives, how people are taking action to adapt and cope, and the types of support they are calling for. This evidence is drawn from participatory mixed-methods research carried out by GTS and partners with communities from 2023 – 2026. Across countries and communities people say that climate impacts are hitting harder, affecting people’s lives, livelihoods and the ways they are thinking about their futures. Communities aren’t getting the support they need: humanitarian aid isn’t effective in helping people cope. People call for support that bolsters and complements their and their communities’ own adaptation strategies, for support that goes beyond a basic lifesaving package to take environmental protection and disaster preparedness into account and for upstream adaptation investments.

People living in the contexts with the most structural inequalities are coping with some of the most acute impacts of climate change, which intersect with conflict, displacement and economic instability to create intractable challenges. Yet these communities aren’t getting the support they need to cope and adapt, and this gap is widening as cuts slash climate finance and pare humanitarian aid down to “lifesaving” basics. Climate action is slipping off the global agenda, just as metastasizing conflict, accelerating climate impacts and global instability push more contexts into fragility. GTS, in collaboration with frontline communities and climate justice advocates wishes to collate evidence of climate impacts on people in the most critical contexts, and the messages these communities have on the support that’s needed to address them.