Climate-Hit Nations Hail Loss and Damage Fund’s Debut Call for Proposals at COP30
London-UK, November 12, 2025
Climate-Hit Nations Hail Loss and Damage Fund’s Debut Call for Proposals at COP30
In a historic moment for climate justice, the newly established Loss and Damage Fund (LDF), created to aid countries most severely impacted by the climate crisis, issued its crucial debut call for project proposals during the ongoing COP30 United Nations climate summit.
The announcement was hailed by leaders of climate-vulnerable nations as a decisive step toward transforming a years-long promise into tangible financial relief.
The call for proposals, which outlines the eligibility criteria and funding priorities, marks the operationalisation of the long-debated fund and focuses on financing projects that address the irreversible, unavoidable consequences of climate change—from relocating communities due to sea-level rise to rebuilding after extreme weather disasters.
Key Headlines
LDF Operational:
The Loss and Damage Fund (LDF) is now officially open to receive funding requests, marking a major turning point in global climate finance.
Funding Priorities:
The initial call targets projects in four key areas: coastal protection and community relocation, climate-linked economic diversification, post-disaster recovery, and strengthening early warning systems.
Eligibility Focus:
The fund will prioritise applications from Least Developed Countries (LDCs), Small Island Developing States (SIDS), and other nations demonstrably suffering from severe, climate-induced damage.
Capital Concerns:
While the call for proposals is a breakthrough, serious concerns remain about the total capitalisation of the fund, which currently falls far short of the estimated hundreds of billions needed annually.
The creation of the Loss and Damage Fund has been the most contentious issue in international climate negotiations for decades, pitting developing nations—who are disproportionately suffering the catastrophic effects of climate change despite contributing minimally to historical emissions—against wealthy industrialised nations.
The final agreement to operationalise the fund was reached at COP29, and its launch at COP30 signifies that the global framework for funding climate-linked devastation is finally in place.
The debut call for proposals outlines a robust yet focused strategy for allocating initial disbursements. The fund’s board has identified four core areas for initial investment, recognising that loss and damage extends beyond just physical infrastructure.
These areas include;
financing the relocation of entire coastal communities rendered uninhabitable by sea-level rise;
supporting the economic diversification of countries whose primary industries, such as agriculture or tourism, have been permanently damaged;
providing immediate and long-term post-disaster recovery and reconstruction after events like super-cyclones; and critically, bolstering early warning systems to limit the human cost of unavoidable future events.
The announcement was met with cautious but profound enthusiasm from the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), whose members face existential threats from rising seas.
Their representatives praised the fund’s operational launch as a vindication of their persistent calls for climate justice, stating that the LDF finally provides a mechanism to address damages that “cannot be adapted to and cannot be avoided.”
The fund is structured to accept contributions from both wealthy industrialised nations and, controversially, from high-emitting developing economies, reflecting the growing expectation that all major emitters should contribute to the solution.
However, the launch of the call for proposals also sharply highlighted the immense gap between the fund’s ambition and its financial reality.
While several nations have pledged initial seed money—totaling just over $1 billion—the United Nations estimates that the annual needs for loss and damage in the developing world will reach $100 to $400 billion by 2030.
Climate activists and vulnerable nations used the COP30 platform to urge major historic emitters, including the United States and European Union members, to dramatically increase their contributions to ensure the fund is meaningful and not merely a symbolic gesture.
Despite the capitalisation challenges, the operationalisation of the LDF and its debut call for proposals is a critical step forward. It formally acknowledges the moral and financial responsibility of the global community for the irreversible consequences of climate change.
As nations begin submitting their projects, the world will watch to see if the promised financial mechanism can scale up quickly enough to provide genuine resilience and justice to the most vulnerable.
