Regional Collaboration Centres drive faster climate implementation
By: Abudu Olalekan
UN Climate Change’s Regional Collaboration Centres (RCCs) had a busy year. According to the just-released RCCs Annual Report 2025, they spent the past 12 months helping governments turn their climate pledges into something real — actual projects on the ground, not just words on paper.
The focus in 2025? Four big areas: mitigation, adaptation, carbon markets, and carbon pricing. The RCCs rolled up their sleeves and gave countries hands-on technical and advisory support to shape and roll out their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), long-term strategies, National Adaptation Plans (NAPs), and Article 6 readiness work.
“In the era of implementation, RCCs are essential across all of UN Climate Change’s core mandates — whether as convenor bringing more partners together, as custodian of the Paris Agreement, or as catalysts supporting governments and others to boost their climate actions,” said Simon Stiell, Executive Secretary of UN Climate Change. He added that the centres are helping countries in every region chase their climate ambitions and deliver the benefits to millions of people worldwide.
“In 2025 they sharpened their offer, focusing on nations’ individual needs and priorities,” Stiell said. “And they’ll continue that approach in the coming year, as they work with countries to turn plans into projects and secure finance. In doing so, RCCs are helping connect the COP process to stronger real-world outcomes at local, national and regional levels.”
By the numbers: 83 countries across six regions got direct support from the RCCs last year. That meant technical assistance, bringing partners to the table, and beefing up institutional capacity. They showed up at Climate Weeks, ran NDC Clinics, hosted regional technical dialogues, and held national workshops — basically doing the unglamorous work of bridging global negotiations with what actually happens at country level.
The report also points to something else worth noting. RCCs are playing a bigger role in helping countries access finance, smoothing out coordination across the UN system, and pulling in development banks, regional bodies, and private sector players to move things faster.
What’s changed? The approach. Instead of broad regional engagement, the RCCs have shifted to a more targeted, country-driven model — built off a thorough needs assessment they ran through the year.
Think of the RCCs as the bridge. Global climate agreements on one side, real-world implementation on the other. They help build national capacity, get stakeholders talking, and — maybe most importantly — they help countries turn vague commitments into actual projects and investment-ready pipelines.
Looking to 2026, the priorities aren’t changing much. The RCCs plan to keep pushing on implementation support, helping countries make NDCs and NAPs investable, opening up better access to climate finance, and making sure countries can fully take part in UNFCCC processes.
Working alongside regional host institutions, the RCCs currently support 143 countries across six regions — offering capacity-building, technical know-how, policy guidance, and coordination, all in line with UN Climate Change’s mandates.
