Context   

The third cycle of National Adaptation Plans (NAP 3.0) represents a decisive shift from strategy design to implementation and investment, tapping a broader array of finance channels and delivery modalities, to accelerate the achievement of adaptation goals.  

Across all biomes, Indigenous Peoples and local communities have long responded to climate change with adaptive knowledge systems and practices grounded in their diverse worldviews and experiences that are simultaneously economic, spiritual, ecological and sociocultural. 

Yet these knowledge systems and diverse worldviews remain peripheral in national planning and largely invisible to adaptation finance because they are often: 

• Relational and cyclical, not linear and output-driven; 

• Family- or community-led, rather than institution-led; 

• Smaller in scale but deeper in holistic thinking, making it difficult to “fit” into conventional metrics. 

Bringing NAP 3.0 in dialogue with Indigenous worldviews and local practices therefore offers a dual opportunity: to strengthen national adaptation processes and to safeguard the rights and agency of those peoples and communities who steward nature for the benefit of all.  

Within this context, the session will explore how the diverse knowledge systems, experiences, and leadership of Indigenous Peoples and local communities can both shape, and be advanced by, NAP 3.0, through the objectives below.

Objectives

• Understanding NAP 3.0 pillars through Indigenous relational ontological lens and local communities’ perspectives, including re-examining what “innovative” adaptation finance means in such contexts.
    
• Surface the multi-dimensional impacts of climate change on Indigenous Peoples and local communities, including non-economic losses (e.g., cultural heritage, place-based knowledge systems, languages, sense of place, and collective stewardship).
   
• Showcase Indigenous and community-led adaptation practice and finance pathways, featuring the first-ever Indigenous Peoples’ National Adaptation Plan (IP-NAP)
   
• Catalyze new partnerships and commitments for financing Indigenous and community-led adaptation plans and action.  
   
• Elevate local communities’ lived experiences and innovative leadership through trans-local exchange and “scaling deep” so that practices take root rather than only expanding the number of sites or size of budgets. 

Expected Outputs and Outcomes

          Outputs
 

1. Policy guidance: concise and actionable recommendations on incorporating diverse worldviews and knowledge systems of Indigenous Peoples and local communities into NAP 3.0
2. Collaboration matrix: One-page map of concrete collaborative opportunities to channel insights from NAP Expo 2025 into the LCIPP Baku workplan implementation, including ways to amplify the LCIPP annual theme.  
3. Innovative adaptation financing commitments: expressions of support (financial and in-kind) for financing Indigenous- and community-led adaptation plans and actions.
   
   Outcomes
    
4. Conceptual shift: enrich participants’ understanding of adaptation as a relational, living process rather than a technical fix, framing that will inform NAP 3.0 moving forward. 
5. Operational shift: sustain the engagement of Indigenous wisdom holders and adaptation practitioners from local communities in the implementation of the NAP 3.0 initiative, including in any relevant advisory and/or expert groups.