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The need to mitigate climate change, and the role that nature can play in doing so, are recognized under multilateral agreements, including the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Changes (UNFCCC) and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).

Effective waste management is a key challenge facing Small Island Developing States. The remoteness of many of these islands and their vulnerability to climate change make the handling and transport of waste both expensive and difficult. The challenge is particularly acute for hazardous waste.

Waste disposal landfill, illegal dumping and backyard burning are favored in most cases, at the expense of more sustainable waste treatment technologies such as composting, anaerobic digesting and recycling.

SEA of solutions is an annually occurring partnership event towards solving plastic pollution at source, convened by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Coordinating Body on the Seas of East Asia (COBSEA). In 2020, about 750 participants from 50 countries explored and addressed priorities in the region to help combat a resurgence in the use of plastics in response to the impacts of the pandemic.

To support the goal of the Alliance to promote lead paint laws, the planned outcome of the lead in paint component is for 40 countries to legislate and implement legislation to restrict the use of lead paint and for at least 30 small and medium enterprises (SME) paint manufactures in seven countries to phase out lead from their production processes.

Sand plays a strategic role in delivering ecosystems, maintaining biodiversity, supporting economic development and providing livelihoods within communities. It is linked to all 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) either directly or indirectly.

Since 1974, the Regional Seas Conventions and Action Plans (RSCAPs) Programme has evolved to consist of eighteen unique instruments for enhancing marine environmental cooperation tailored to regional specificites that are strategically placed to respond to the urgent call for securing planetary health.

This report was compiled by contributors from regional seas conventions and action plans, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the United Nations Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC

Global plastics production has risen exponentially over the last decades - now amounting to some 400 million tonnes per year. Although plastic serves many useful purposes, its rapidly growing production and consumption coupled with a lack of a circular approaches keeping plastic in the economy and out of the environment.

Coral reefs face threats from climate change and local pressures, but many initiatives designed to deliver conservation outcomes for them and the social-economic system they support are limited by sustainable finance and the availability of funds over the long term.