New CBM research reveals the barriers to disability-inclusive climate finance
Stories | Published: November 11, 2026
A new CBM-commissioned report released at COP31 reveals a persistent gap between promises of disability inclusion and climate finance in practice.
A new CBM-commissioned report, Disability-Inclusive Climate Finance: The Road to COP31 and Beyond (PDF, 2mb), examines how funding from three major international climate funds reaches national and local organisations in Kenya, Indonesia and Nepal.
The findings reveal that the parameters determining who receives funding, who makes decisions and how success is measured rarely make disability inclusion a requirement. Although policies recognise disability, commitments to inclusion are rarely put into practice. This exposes a persistent gap between policy commitments and implementation.
The report highlights three examples:
- Kenya: Climate finance reaches all 47 counties in the country, but there is no consistent funding route to Organisations of Persons with Disabilities (OPDs), which also lack systematic representation in local decision-making.
- Indonesia: National climate spending systems do not consistently track disability inclusion, while complex funding requirements make it difficult for smaller organisations, including OPDs, to access finance.
- Nepal: Disability is recognised in climate policies, but there are no shared requirements defining what disability-inclusive outcomes projects must achieve.
Across the evidence reviewed, researchers identified no case where funding from the three climate funds reached an OPD directly. Although the report could not establish how much climate finance reaches people with disabilities overall, this finding is important because OPDs are led by people with disabilities themselves. It shows how they can be excluded from both financial resources and the power to decide how they’re used – which is what can prevent policy commitments from becoming meaningful action.
What needs to change to make climate finance disability-inclusive?
Launched at COP31, the report shows that the building blocks for fairer climate finance already exist. The challenge is making them work together. For example, approaches to gender equality could be adapted to make disability inclusion a measurable requirement when funding is approved, allocated and monitored.
The report also highlights why locally led finance is not automatically inclusive. Bringing funding closer to communities does not guarantee that people with disabilities have a say in how it is used. It must go further than this, to ensure OPDs have meaningful roles in setting priorities, making decisions and allocating resources, with funding available to support accessible participation.
And these changes must work together. From involving OPDs at the earliest stages of planning to removing barriers to accessing finance and monitoring outcomes, a joined-up approach is essential.
Turning commitments into meaningful action at COP31
COP31 is an opportunity to make climate finance fairer, more accessible and more accountable. CBM is calling on governments, international climate funds and decision-makers to ensure disability inclusion is built into climate financing decisions – and that people with disabilities and their representative organisations have the power to shape those decisions.
The true measure of progress will not be how often disability is mentioned in climate agreements, but whether people with disabilities have greater influence, greater access to resources and a fairer share of the benefits of climate action. Because climate justice cannot be achieved without disability inclusion.
Explore the findings and recommendations
Read CBM’s new report, Disability-Inclusive Climate Finance: The Road to COP31 and Beyond (PDF, 2mb), to explore the findings and recommendations.
Image: Through a CBM-supported programme, the Imani Inuka Widows Group in Kenya makes climate-smart briquettes as a sustainable alternative to charcoal. This is one of many CBM-supported programmes helping to build sustainable livelihoods in a changing climate.
https://www.cbm.org.au/stories/disabilityinclusiveclimatefinance
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