The best available science shows that keeping global warming below the 1.5°C limit during this century, established in the Paris Agreement, is still possible, but will now almost certainly involve a period of temporary “overshoot”. The average increase of global temperature is now likely to exceed the 1.5°C limit, but with sufficient reductions in emissions it could return below 1.5°C by the end of the century. The 1.5°C limit remains critical for a liveable planet: every fraction of a degree higher means more lost lives and livelihoods, with the heaviest impacts on the most vulnerable, including communities already experiencing humanitarian needs.
Overshooting the 1.5°C limit will have significant consequences. As temperatures rise, hazards are likely to compound and last longer, with more frequent extremes and slow onset stresses interacting over time to strain food, water, health and protection systems. Even if temperatures eventually peak and begin to fall, the risk profile will not simply revert to what it was before. Humanitarian response will experience irreversible changes, for example in low lying coasts and deltas where sea level rise and salinization will bring lasting new challenges and reshape where and how people can live.
Overview of the CERF climate envelope 2025
Through the CERF Climate Action Account, humanitarian partners are channelling additional resources to climate vulnerable communities, scaling Anticipatory Action, and providing life-saving humanitarian assistance, while building community resilience. Dedicated climate envelopes in 2024 and 2025 are supporting practical, high-impact solutions in 17 countries. These include solar powered drinking water and drip irrigation systems, flood resilient water, sanitation and hygiene activities, and locally led protection of livelihoods, all designed to save lives and reduce future risk. The most recent innovative climate envelope totals $9.5 million across eight operations in Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Chad, Mauritania, Niger, Somalia, Venezuela and Zambia. Six of these operations are in fragile and conflict-affected contexts. These activities are possible due to generous support from Australia, Chad, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Latvia, Luxembourg, Monaco, and Portugal.
Anticipatory Action
As the climate crisis drives a sharp rise in humanitarian needs, anticipatory action has become an essential part of how humanitarians adapt to a new risk regime. In October, as exceptionally warm ocean temperatures intensified Tropical Storm Melissa, Haiti and Cuba activated their anticipatory action frameworks for tropical cyclones. Within hours of early warnings, $8 million in pre-arranged CERF funding enabled partners to act before storm impact, helping families secure water, reinforce shelters, and safeguard livelihoods in high-risk coastal areas. These activations underscore how science-based preparedness and pre-arranged finance can reduce losses before disaster strikes. As global heating accelerates, storms are intensifying more rapidly and striking harder, threatening communities already on the front lines of crisis. Anticipatory action helps ensure that, even in an era of climate overshoot, humanitarians can act earlier and more effectively to protect those most at risk.
Scaling global coverage
From the Caribbean to Africa and the Pacific, OCHA now facilitates coordinated anticipatory action in more than 20 countries, helping governments and partners act ahead of floods, droughts, cyclones and disease outbreaks. Many frameworks are now integrated into national disaster management systems, reflecting growing local ownership and alignment with national policies. Financing is increasingly pre-arranged through OCHA-managed pooled funds – including CERF and the Country and Regional Funds – and dedicated financing by partners allowing for faster, more predictable, and more locally driven responses when agreed triggers are met.
To further strengthen predictability, OCHA is also advancing new risk-transfer approaches, including an insurance product, to help safeguard anticipatory finance in years of multiple or severe climate shocks. These efforts aim to ensure that resources remain available when they are needed most.
Sharpening forecasts and partnerships
OCHA is advancing strategic partnerships to sharpen risk information for decisions before impact. A partnership with the U.S. National Science Foundation National Center for Atmospheric Research (NSF NCAR) is aimed at improving the forecasts that guide anticipatory action and planning, with a particular focus on annual to decadal outlooks of future climate conditions. These outlooks can guide longer-term planning, for example by helping predict how hazards are likely to evolve and determine which types of anticipatory action frameworks should be developed in specific countries.
In addition, the cooperation with the China Meteorological Administration (CMA) is moving from intent to implementation. Earlier this year, OCHA and CMA agreed with a letter of intent on early warning and early action and began technical exchanges. The collaboration aims to pair CMA capabilities with humanitarian partners so that timely warnings lead to effective local anticipatory action.
Thematic Focus: Protection
A new report by UN Women entitled “At Risk and Underfunded: How Funding Cuts are Threatening Efforts to End Violence against Women” was published in October. The report surveyed 428 women’s rights and women led globally, almost half in conflict and humanitarian contexts. The report reveals the clear and alarming impacts of funding cuts to women’s organisations, and to women and girls and marginalized communities. Concrete examples of the impact include:
- Direct implications for life saving services - 40.5 per cent of women’s organisations have had to reduce direct services such as shelters, legal aid, and psychosocial support.
- In humanitarian and conflict zones (e.g., Ukraine, Burkina Faso), over 60 per cent of organizations suspended or reduced programming, leaving survivors of gender-based violence without recourse.
- Nearly half of women’s organisations in humanitarian settings report they may shut down within six months, with 65 per cent of local and grassroots organisations report being impacted.
- Funding cuts have forced women’s organisations to abandon long-term advocacy for short-term donordriven projects, weakening feminist movements and work on politicized issues.
Access to funding for gender and GBV related services is more critical now than ever to ensure that women and girls remain at the centre of humanitarian action. According to the data reported to the Financial Tracking Service as of 31 October 2025, only 17.6 per cent ($196.1 million) of the $1.12 billion of requirements for the gender-based violence sector has been reported. This is a significant drop from the $359.7 million reported last year for GBV activities in the GHO. Current Humanitarian Needs and Response Plans with sectoral coverage below the global average include Burkina Faso, Chad, Colombia, Haiti, Mali, Mozambique, Myanmar, Niger, Nigeria, Somalia, Yemen, and Venezuela.
