The Kyrgyz Republic committed to combating climate change and accelerating the transition to climate-resilient, low-carbon sustainable modes of development, being a Party to the UNFCCC since 2000, and having ratified all relevant subsequent agreements, such as the Paris Agreement. The country also submitted its intended nationally determined contributions (later called the first Nationally Determined Contribution, NDC) in September 2015.

The Government of the Kyrgyz Republic gives a status of state importance to climate issues, as evidenced by the appointment the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kyrgyz Republic as the UNFCCC focal point in January 2020. The institutional arrangements set up for climate change response with the establishment of the Coordination Council for Green Economy and Climate Change holding the mandate for coordination of climate change response, builds a strong foundation for combating climate change in Kyrgyzstan.

With Kyrgyzstan’s first Biennial Update Report approaching completion and the Fourth National Communication works under way, the State Agency on Environment Protection and Forestry under the Government of the Kyrgyz Republic (SAEPF) has led a GHG inventory which serves as a basis for the NDC to be submitted for COP 26 UNFCCC. This ensures that the country can review its NDC targets by the COP 26 meeting and is expected to achieve its stated contributions by 2030.

Launched in 2019, the Climate Promise is UNDP’s commitment to support at least 100 countries to enhance their NDCs by 2020, by working with countries to make their NDCs more technically robust and include new ways that governments can step up their climate actions, as well as finance these bold goals. UNDP announced it would leverage its extensive climate portfolio and scale up urgently-needed support for NDC enhancement in 100 countries, including Kyrgyzstan working in close collaboration with UN system partners (e.g. UNEP, FAO, UNICEF), IRENA, the NDC Partnership, the Green Climate Fund, and other strategic partners.

The NDC update process in Kyrgyzstan initiated with the line ministries in February 2020 helps understand better whether some of the targets will need to be adjusted and whether Kyrgyzstan can raise its level of ambition in a few areas.

The NDC update process in Kyrgyzstan initiated with the line ministries in February 2020 helps understand better whether some of the targets will need to be adjusted and whether Kyrgyzstan can raise its level of ambition in a few areas.

According to the UNDP Climate Promise work plan developed for the NDC update process, the NDC will be revisited and the NDC targets reviewed with possible new areas of action agreed until the first quarter of 2021.

NDCs should contain a range of different and solid mitigation contributions. In order to accelerate the climate action and provide comprehensive inclusion of mitigation actions into the NDC and strategic advice, including on non-NDC-related matters as pertinent to climate change mitigation, UNDP is to hire the Climate Change Mitigation Specialist who will be in charge of climate change mitigation activities and initiatives.