KEY MESSAGES FOR THE FOURTH MEETING OF THE ADVISORY BOARD OF THE SANTIAGO NETWORK FOR LOSS AND DAMAGE

By the Loss and Damage Collaboration

14/4/25

In Amarah, Iraq, farmer Jabaar Matar, demonstrates how drought and water scarcity is increasing soil salinity thereby making his land unusable for planting crops. Iraq follows Vanuatu as the second developing country to request technical assistance from the Santiago Network for Loss and Damage. The request focuses on the development of a comprehensive programme to assess and calculate the economic costs of loss and damage resulting from the impacts of the climate crisis on Iraq’s agriculture and water resources sectors. Image credit: Sebastian Castelier / Shutterstock.

The Fourth Meeting of the Advisory Board of the Santiago Network for Loss and Damage (SNLD) will take place from 15 to 17 April 2025, in Geneva, Switzerland. It will be preceded by a members-only informal meeting on 14 April 2025. An indicative schedule of work is available online. The provisional agenda includes important issues, including but not limited to:

Election of the Co-Chairs of the Advisory board;
Reporting on the activities of the Secretariat and Co-Chairs respectively;
Matters relating to the operationalisation of the SNLD including:
- Designation of organisations, bodies, networks and experts (OBNEs) as members of the SNLD;
- Provision of technical assistance;
- Managing funding provided for technical assistance; and
- Outreach and knowledge products;
Secretariat recruitment and regional presence;
SNLD strategy;
Communications;
Resource mobilisation;
2025 Budget; and
Date and venue of the SNLD Advisory Board’s fifth meeting (SNAB5).

The following key messages, which will continue to be updated, build upon an extensive body of work as part of the L&DC’s SNLD Project are arranged according to selected agenda items (1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12) and are not necessarily comprehensive or arranged in order of how they will be addressed during SNAB4. Instead they are intended to provide some guidance as to the elements that the Advisory Board can focus its attention on while they have the opportunity of an in person meeting and also considering the timing and progress in the full operationalisation of the SNLD.

Read the full text here:

Watch the video here:

The development of these key messages has been supported by the Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung New York Office with support from the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

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The publishers are solely responsible for the content of this publication; the opinions presented here do not reflect the position of the BMZ. We also note that views and any errors, are the authors alone and that the content of this brief does not necessarily represent the views of all the members of the Loss and Damage Collaboration.