FAQ

The three-day event was a joint effort hosted by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK) and co-organised with the NDC Partnership, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, under the International Climate Initiative (IKI).

The Global NDC Conference 2023, took place in Berlin from 31 May-2 June 2023. Our venue was the Scandic Berlin Potsdamer Platz hotel. 

Please note that this event already took place. It was an invitation-only event and any participation was subject to approval and confirmation by the Conference organising team.

Should you be interested in learning more about the conference, please reach out to us at info [at] globalndcconference.org to express your interest in attending next time. Based on availability of places and considering representation balance, the organising team will get back to you as soon as possible.

The Global NDC Conference has contributed to the conversation on NDCs over the years. This includes sharing experiences on INDC development (in 2014 and 2015), to exchanging on climate governance, finance, and transparency (in 2017 and 2019)—aiming to inspire policymakers and practitioners to accelerate the pace towards transformational climate action around the world.

Our last two editions of the Global NDC Conference gathered more than 600 participants from 80 countries. In 2023, the Global NDC Conference aims to inspire climate practitioners and policy makers to lead and contribute to processes and coordination that enable just, feasible and financeable NDCs, grounded in learning from implementation and previous updates.

Three main themes steered the conversations at the conference this year. Each theme guided a conference day:

• Day 1 – Governance and policy alignment for implementation,
• Day 2 – Mobilising finance for implementation, and
• Day 3 – Raising ambition through innovation and scale.

For further information on plenary and breakout sessions, please check out the preliminary Agenda.

330+ participants are expected to attend the conference, including senior advisors and decision makers from national and subnational governments, think tanks, actors from the private sector, NGOs, and youth organisations, and international institutions, all of whom are important stakeholders in the update and implementation of NDCs.

The Conference aims to provide a space for:

• strengthening the network of practitioners and policymakers around NDCs;
• showcasing innovative ideas, approaches, positive examples, lessons learned and good practices;
• building momentum for ambitious, timely and scaled-up NDC implementation;
• reflecting on and strengthening participants’ capacity and agency to lead NDC processes in their context; and
• creating clarity around NDC update processes, next steps, and roles of different actors.

Outcomes of our conference will be collected, condensed, and published on our website, as well as in relevant climate-related knowledge hubs. They will also feed into strategic discussions and activities of the organising partners, aiming to inform and contribute to relevant climate-related milestones and processes.

The working language of the Global NDC Conference 2023 will be English.

The Global NDC Conference 2023 is open to hear from the international climate community. Please reach out to us at info [at] globalndcconference.org with your ideas.

The Global NDC Conference is a safe space for networking and creating clarity around the NDC update process. Relevant visual materials and publicly available documents will be made available on our website, attributed the organisations responsible for them.

 We invite participants to share their own contributions and views publicly. However, participants are asked to not publicly disclose or attribute sensitive information or opinions from other participants, unless consent was given in the first place. 

Sustainability is at the core of the Global NDC Conference. The organising team is dedicated to reducing the footprint of this event as much as possible. Therefore, we are committed to implement the three R’s principle (reduce, reuse, recycle), compensating emissions, and raising overall awareness about the importance of sustainability. 

For this purpose, the organising team has developed its own sustainability action plan (SAP). Our SAP covers six areas and defines in total 25 actions, such as: 

• Mobility (e.g., informing and incentivising to use public transport connections and offsetting CO2 emissions from flights). All flights being organized for the Global NDC Conference 2023 through UNDP will offset air travel carbon emissions through Certified Emission Reductions (CERs) procured from the Adaptation Fund. 

• Waste & water management (e.g., providing treated tap water, using reusable materials, separating, and recycling our waste, going paper-free where possible),  
• Catering (e.g., reducing food waste, purchasing local and regional foods)  
• Procurement of products (e.g., choosing sustainability-conscious and regional suppliers, minimizing goodies). 

We strive for you as participants to be part of a sustainable conference by implementing the above measure and others. As participants, you will have a direct impact with your actions on reducing emissions and act towards sustainability. Communicating the importance of these is a priority to ensure that all conference participants are aware of their impact on the environment. 

For further information on how to make your journey in Berlin sustainable, please visit: 10 tips for a sustainable trip to Berlin | visitBerlin.de. 

The Global NDC Conference organising team is committed with various actions to ensure gender balance, gender equality, diversity, and inclusion. Therefore, we:  

• Commit  to integrate measures of diversity and gender into all phases of the conference, inspired by a gender-responsive event management approach.  
• Recognize the need to address intersectionality, meaning the discrimination of a person due to overlapping and simultaneous impacts and thus apply an intersectional lens throughout our planning.  
• Strive to be as inclusive as possible by ensuring a gender and diversity balance at all our events; empowering women, and marginalised groups as speakers; using gender sensitive language; and implementing an anti-harassment policy.  

• Aim to provide spaces where diverse perspectives can be expressed, all people can actively participate and to raise the overall awareness among all participants about the importance of including women and various marginalized groups in climate action.  

Like in 2019, the Global NDC Conference 2023 has a Code of Conduct in place dedicated to providing a harassment-free conference experience for everyone, regardless of gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, age or religion. Should you require more information about our policy, please contact conference organizers at the venue or send an email to info[at]globalndcconference.org.  

Please check our website for the latest updates on the agenda, speakers, and background information. Any time-critical information (e.g., related to general announcements, last-minute changes, etc.), will be shared via email with accredited participants. A logistics note will be made available in advance for accredited participants.

After submitting your registration, please make sure you have heard back from the Global NDC Conference 2023 organising team via email confirming 1) that your registration has been received, and 2) that your participation has been approved. Only then are you considered accredited as a participant.

On the other hand, please check official information related to travel restrictions to Germany and entry requirements (e.g., the German Federal Ministry of Health and the German Federal Foreign Office).

As the Global NDC Conference 2023 will be held in Berlin, Germany, travel restrictions and entry requirements are dependent on German and European Union regulations. For more information, please consult official information, for example, of the German Federal Foreign Office, the German Embassy or Consulate in your respective country and/or the Directorate-General for Migration and Home Affairs of the European Commission (e.g., Visa for Germany and/or Who must apply for a Schengen visa).

Accredited participants that require a visa for Germany, are expected to take care of this process and cover the respective fees on their own. Please be mindful of appointment and processing times of visas (this information should be available at the websites of the German Embassies and Consulates in respective countries).  Should an accredited participant require further personalized assistance with their visa application, the organising team of the Global NDC Conference 2023 will strive to support such accredited participants to the best of our ability and within our capacities (e.g., by issuing supporting documents related to your participation at the Conference).

Financial support for travel and accommodation of participants is available to a limited extent. Should you require financial support, and the organising team has not yet mentioned it during your registration process, please make sure to flag this as soon as possible. In this case, depending on availability and relevance, financial support to attend the Conference may be allocated on a ‘first come first served’ basis, depending on the previously defined criteria set by the organising team (e.g., representation balance).

We look forward to seeing you at the Conference! Your active participation and engagement will be vital to the discussions and will surely enrich everyone’s experience.

All conference participants are expected to behave in accordance with professional standards, as well as with their respective employer’s policies governing appropriate workplace behaviour, and applicable laws. Take a look at our Code of Conduct, dedicated to providing an inclusive and safe conference space for everyone.

The Global NDC Conference 2023 is thought as an in-person event. Unlike previous editions, livestreaming and online sessions are, therefore, not foreseen.

If you are not able to attend yourself, you may propose an alternate nomination from your organisation to participate instead.

Please reach out the to the organising team as soon as possible via the email address the invitation to attend the Conference was first issued. Please make sure your nominee brings the necessary expertise on coordinating NDC updates and implementation to actively engage in, and contribute to, the Conference. Please consider in your nominations that we are striving for a gender-balanced event and that the working language of the conference will be English.

In case travel and accommodation has already been arranged for you by the organising team, please be aware that we will try to make all the necessary changes. However, last-minute cancellation fees may apply, depending on the case.

Please note this is an invitation-only event and any participation is subject to approval by the Conference organising team. In case of participating on behalf of someone else (e.g., by appointment, delegation, or nomination by an already invited participant), please make sure to let the organising team know through the email address the invitation was first issued. The organising team will be happy to follow-up on your registration process.

As a climate conference, we encourage accredited participants to connect their travel to Berlin (for the purpose of our Conference) to other relevant climate events happening around the same time in Europe.

In case your travel and accommodation are being sponsored by the organising team, and you are attending other climate events in Europe, please flag this as soon as possible; we will do our best to reduce your travel.

Please consult our data privacy policy for more information.