loped cities spend significantly more per capita. After all, most things cost a lot more in the US than in Ethiopia, and new drainage systems, air conditioning and so on are no different.
But this same disparity also applies as a percentage of city GDP. The three rich cities we looked at spend nearly half as much again as the developing cities (around 0.22% of city GDP, compared to 0.15%), even though climate change is a far scarier prospect for low-lying, flood-prone Jakarta or already-hot Addis Ababa than it is for London or Paris.
Of course, cities in poorer countries have greater competing needs for their finances. Things Londoners or Parisians can take for granted such as clean water or basic healthcare are still pressing issues in Lagos or Mumbai.
Yet such disparity still has to end, particularly as between now and 2050 the major growth in urban populations will be in China, India, Indonesia and Nigeria. In these countries we need to think about how to boost cities’ resilience through far more adaptation funding.
It can be done. Just look at Beijing, which stands out because the proportion of its economy devoted to climate adaptation was significantly higher than any other city in the study. Almost half of this was spent on changes to the built environment such as water efficiency retrofitting – a much higher ratio than any other city – with less going towards health or agriculture.
The fact the Chinese capital is taking adaptation seriously is linked to strong central government policies, which encourage cities to face up to climate change. In China, all provinces have a comprehensive adaptation plan and a taskforce to deliver it. When governments offer leadership and policy certainty, things will happen.
Most cities at least show solid growth in adaptation spending over the past five years, beyond their average GDP growth for the period. But adaptation spending was more volatile in Addis Ababa and Lagos, the cities in the study that spent the least in real, proportional and per capita terms, and heavily-dependent on a few specific projects. This should be a cause for concern.
It is clear that insufficient funds are being spent to protect major population centres in developing and emerging economies. Our study is an early warning sign: we must remain focused on protecting people at risk, and not just the “capital”.