How these key summer events set the scene for COP30 in Brazil

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Jul 18, 2025

Tom Beloe, Director of the Sustainable Finance Hub at the UN Development Programme, discusses key summer sustainability events shaping COP30 in Brazil. He highlights the recent UN Ocean Conference outcomes, including progress on a Marine Biodiversity Treaty and the importance of multilateral cooperation. Beloe emphasizes the necessity of innovative financing for sustainable development goals, especially in light of geopolitical challenges. The conversation also delves into the role of private sector partnerships in navigating the path toward impactful climate action.

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INSIGHT

Ocean Conference Delivered Financing Momentum

The 2025 UN Ocean Conference in Nice advanced the BBNJ treaty and produced the Nice Ocean Action Plan with 800+ voluntary commitments.
Major commitments included €1bn from the European Commission and the launch of One Ocean Finance to mobilize private capital.

INSIGHT

Bonn as The COP Dress Rehearsal

Bonn acts as the UNFCCC's annual dress rehearsal, revealing priorities ahead of COP and new emphases like insurance.
Discussions highlighted slow NDC updates and a growing focus on adaptation indicators and finance.

INSIGHT

Global Goal On Adaptation Is Taking Shape

Negotiators are working toward a Global Goal on Adaptation with indicators countries would report on, potentially including adaptation finance metrics.
This aims to guide investment and give private sector clarity on resilience needs.

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In this episode of the All Things Sustainable podcast, we’re taking listeners on a whistlestop tour of several big summer events in Europe that will shape sustainability discussions on the road to COP30, the UN Climate Change Conference in Belém, Brazil in November 2025.

We cover key outcomes from the 2025 United Nations Ocean Conference in Nice, France — including progress toward a Marine Biodiversity Treaty.

We talk to Beth Burks, Director on the Sustainable Finance Markets team at S&P Global Ratings, about her takeaways from annual climate meetings in Bonn, Germany.

“If COP is like the big show every year, then Bonn is the dress rehearsal,” Beth explains.

Beth also shares highlights from London Climate Action Week, which in 2025 grew significantly to include more than 700 events and more than 45,000 attendees.

In the episode we also speak to Tom Beloe, Director of the Sustainable Finance Hub at the UN Development Programme, or UNDP. Tom shares big takeaways from the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development, or FFD4, in Sevilla Spain. The conference took place for the first time in a decade this summer and centered around financing for the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, or SDGs.

A unifying theme across all these events is the importance of multilateralism to address sustainability challenges that transcend borders, like climate change, nature loss and ocean conservation. Across these events, we also hear about the rising role the private sector plays in addressing and financing solutions to these challenges.

“I think we're seeing over the last 10 years a very much increasing trend of private sector participation,” Tom tells us. “Frankly, the discussions of finance that happen in these conferences are a little bit meaningless if we're not also convening with the largest financial institutions in the world.”

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This piece was published by S&P Global Sustainable1 and not by S&P Global Ratings, which is a separately managed division of S&P Global.

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