One priority for the COP29 Climate Champion and the COP29 Presidency Team this year is climate proofing small businesses. There are substantial numbers of SMEs, who are under-resourced, and who have an important role to play if properly empowered.
Independent, rigorous, academic evidence globally can underpin effective SME climate action.
Working in collaboration with global partners and networks we are looking for academics who are experts on SMEs and climate change to:
- Engage in an online dialogue on this subject with colleagues across the globe (targeting 23/24 Oct)
- Provide links to their existing research publications in this broad subject area and/or brief plain language summaries of their research
- Potentially contribute to a high level policy focused hybrid event at COP29, and inform conversations between the high level champions and key policy makers/party and Non-State-Actor representatives
The given time frame is short; the aims for each are select:
- Networks will be developed from the dialogue through to the COP presentation and hopefully beyond.
- The dialogue will set out questions, key issues, and evidence.
- The presentation at COP will include a short, sharp summary in plain language with links to academic evidence (and translations).
There is the possibility for funding to support further research following the COP – a year of developing knowledge, building networks, and building actions from evidence.
We hope that academic contributions to climate proofing small businesses will:
- Further interlink experts and build dialogues between SMEs and academics locally and globally;
- Further the subject area and improve the evidence base;
- Consider how to act on academic insight and create impact;
- Be conducted in an equitable and representative manner.
In Collaboration:
