Delegates from nearly 200 countries are attending the final week of COP27 in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt to discuss how the global community can best mitigate and adapt to climate change. We thought now would be a good time to revisit the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s summary of impacts from Working Group II’s contribution to the 6th assessment report.

The report puts humankind into context on a global scale, emphasizing the intricate and innumerable relationships between human society, climate, and biodiversity on our planet. It shows how we are impacting these systems and the changes we can make to reduce the magnitude of our impacts. Further, it highlights how the degradation of these systems will in turn inflict impacts upon us: from rising sea levels and heat waves to droughts, more frequent extreme weather events, and changes to the distributions of species we rely on.

The time to act as a global community is now. We can reduce greenhouse gas emissions and widespread environmental degradation while supporting those who are most vulnerable through adaptation measures, sustainable development, low carbon energy, and circular economies.