The participation of actors from the Global South, both in national and international processes, is extremely important. Latin American cities and states are increasingly feeling the impacts of climate change, facing significant climate hazards, and observing consecutive years of record heat, drought, and flooding.
As the 10th largest country in the world by population, and the 2nd largest Latin American country by population, Mexico is at the center of developing strategies for climate adaptation and mitigation. In the wake of environmental risks and extreme events, and in a bid to drive progress, Mexican sub-national governments will play a decisive role in the implementation of the global climate agenda in the coming years, along with all its cities and states.
Therefore, the exercise of transparency by Mexican subnational governments helps to position them at the forefront of climate action in the region, and on the international stage. Transparency is essential in political processes, to achieving the long-term goals of the Paris Agreement, and for implementing public policies that are efficient, effective, and inclusive for the population. Likewise, it enables the sharing of experiences, solutions, and challenges, and provides access to sources of financing for sustainable investments. Such collaborative actions will bring significant social benefits for Mexican citizens, while also bringing economic opportunities at the state, municipal, and regional level.
ANAAE – A new opportunity for strategic alliances
The ANAAE (National Association of State Environmental Authorities) is the association of environmental authorities of the Federative Entities of Mexico. It was created in 2000 through the initiative of several environmental secretaries of the federative entities to achieve sustainable development at the state, regional, and national level through the close collaboration between the state environmental authorities.
ANAAE functions as a coordinating body, working and linking state environmental authorities to enhance the efforts of associates, and fostering a network of exchange of successful experiences to drive cooperation with strategic allies. They do so by integrating the different social, environmental, and economic perspectives of Mexico’s climate situation.
Alongside CDP, ANAAE has worked in the last year to disseminate the importance of environmental action, reporting and monitoring by Mexican subnational governments through the CDP States and Regions programme, and ensuring that more actors are committed to transparently disclosing their information related to climate, forests, and water security.
Thanks to the support of ANAAE, 26 of the 32 Mexican federative entities have reported their environmental information through CDP’s platform in 2022 (including Mexico City, which is also part of ANAAE and C40, and reports to the CDP Cities Questionnaire ). This corresponds to 81% of the Mexican federative entities, and represents a population of over 103 million people, which amounts to 70% of the total population of Mexico. As of 2022, Mexico is one of the countries with the most disclosing states (along with Brazil - through the CDP States and Regions Questionnaire) in the world.
Disclosing Mexico’s Potential - Collaborative initiatives in action
As one of the most experienced organizations in environmental transparency for cities, states and companies, CDP has worked alongside the State of Jalisco, an example of the power of collaboration between diverse actors to further endorse accountability. As a result of this initiative, all 125 municipalities of the State of Jalisco – through their 13 Municipal Boards and the Metropolitan Region of Guadalajara – have reported to the CDP Cities Questionnaire, both in 2021 and 2022. The questionnaire’s modules for subnational governments are structured to address all topics relevant to the environmental agenda, including, among others, climate hazards that are being faced, emission inventories, climate action and mitigation plans, governance information and financing needs. This provides a key overview for the State of Jalisco, as the understanding of their current reality will support them in the development of actions in accordance with what has been reported, and for the formulation of public policies.
Likewise, the State of Jalisco has further collaborated with CDP in the private sector, as it invited companies from its territory to participate in a training for companies on emissions and Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) that was provided by CDP as part of the UK-Mexico Pact. This capacity building session was aimed at providing an overview of the framework and to conduct an in-depth analysis of the criteria, methods, and tools available for companies to set their emissions reduction targets.
It is essential that a robust climate action agenda is implemented in subnational governments for there to be a significant change both for the territories and for the populations. However, if working alone, state governments will have great difficulty in reversing negative trends in the impact of climate hazards. An action agenda that creates links between businesses, civil society groups, and local governments can be a fundamental key to strengthen subnational efforts and climate ambitions: for this reason, transparency in environmental action must be strengthened.
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