​Building the capacity of developing countries to deal with climate change is a core part of the work of the Consultative Group of Experts (CGE), which met in Bonn earlier this month to take stock of its progress.

The CGE provides technical advice and support to developing country Parties. It does this by helping developing countries prepare and submit national communications, biennial update reports and biennial transparency reports.

Following the adoption of CGE’s revised terms of reference at COP26 and the development of its work programme for 2022–2026 and 2022 workplan, the 8^th meeting of the CGE took place in Bonn on 1 and 2 September 2022. The meeting reviewed the progress of implementation of the CGE’s annual workplan and considered the submission of its progress report to the Subsidiary Body for Implementation (SBI).

Key highlights among the achievements of the CGE in 2022 include:

• Organizing a side-event at the June 2022 Bonn Climate Change Conference, entitled Applying the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Sixth Assessment Report in climate change reporting.
• Hosting  three webinars in July and August 2022 that explored why climate transparency arrangements matter at the national level. Two of the webinars were held in English for the Africa and Asia-Pacific regions and one took place in Spanish for the Latin America and the Caribbean region. In total, they were attended by 197 experts. According to a feedback survey, the respondents were satisfied with and appreciated the quality of the webinars, and found the presentations to be clear, precise, and useful.
• Updating a technical report on problems, constraints and lessons learned on the capacity-building needs of developing countries. The report analyzed the most recent 151 national communications and 79 biannual update reports from 152 developing country Parties. It also analyzed 38 summary reports on the technical analysis of biannual update reports published by 30 June 2022.
• Publishing e-learning courses on the secretariat’s Learning Management System that cover vulnerability and adaptation assessment, mitigation assessment and national greenhouse gas inventories. As of 4 August 2022, 133 participants had registered for the courses.
• Updating its training materials for reporting on mitigation and adaptation. The updated training materials include relevant parts of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Sixth Assessment Report and will be made available by the end of 2022.

Upcoming CGE events include:

• ​Regional hands-on training workshops on tracking progress of nationally determined contributions under the enhanced transparency framework. One workshop will be organized for the Asia-Pacific region from 19 to 21 October 2022 in Yerevan, Armenia. Two workshops will be organized for the Africa, and Latin America and Caribbean regions from 6 to 8 December 2022 in Bonn.
• A side event at COP27 in November and the 5^th informal forum of the CGE in December to showcase its achievements and to learn from the experiences of Parties in their transition to the enhanced transparency framework and preparation of biannual transparency reports.

More information on the outcomes of the 8^th meeting of the CGE can be found here.​