The UN Environment Programme (UNEP) works to identify and draw attention to emerging issues of environmental concern. The UNEP Frontiers’ report continues to advance this work, signaling environmental issues and solutions for effective and timely responses. Some issues may be local, relatively small-scale issues today, but may have the potential to become an issue of regional or global concern if not addressed early.

The Ecological Threat Report (ETR) is a comprehensive, datadriven analysis covering 3,638 sub-national administrative units in 228 independent countries and territories. It covers 99.99 per cent of the world's population and assesses threats relating to food security, water stress, population pressures and natural disasters. The report identifies countries that are most at risk of catastrophic outcomes due to ecological threats and uses the lens of societal resilience to predict the countries most likely to suffer from instability and conflict in the future.

This research sought to measure public awareness and levels of support for an agreement in 28 countries around the world for a legally binding global instrument to address plastic pollution.

Amidst growing concern about the impacts of plastic on the oceans, ecosystems, and human health, there’s another largely hidden dimension of the plastic crisis: plastic’s contribution to global greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. This report examines each of these stages of the plastic lifecycle to identify the major sources of greenhouse gas emissions, sources of uncounted emissions, and uncertainties that likely lead to underestimation of plastic’s climate impacts.

Climate Change Mitigation: Policies and Lessons for Asia highlights evidence-based approaches for advancing decarbonization across sectors. It offers timely insights for policy makers and scholars seeking to better understand the region’s climate change mitigation challenges, policy approaches for fostering emissions breakthroughs, and the sustainable development implications.

This Report shows that countries’ climate pledges rely on unrealistic amounts of land-based carbon removal. These cannot be achieved without significant negative impacts on livelihoods, land rights, and ecosystems. Our research suggests that countries should seek to reduce their expected reliance on land-based carbon removal and must instead make much deeper cuts in emissions.

The State of the Global Climate in 2022 is produced on an annual basis, complementing the most recent long assessment cycle provided by the sixth IPCC Assessment Report. This is the provisional version; the full and final report is expected to be published in March 2023. The report provides an authoritative voice on the current state of the climate using key climate indicators and reporting on extreme events and their impacts. Collecting and analysing data from these variables takes time— where 2022 data is not yet available, figures from 2021 are provided.

Eleven million tonnes of plastic ends up in the ocean every year4. Plastic waste pollutes every corner of the ocean, threatens aquatic wildlife, and even ends up in the seafood we eat. And despite growing awareness, the problem continues to get worse.

The climate crisis is upon us. Despite repeated scientific warnings, state climate action is lagging far behind what is needed to protect human rights. This report showcases communities’ experiences in seven brief case studies to provide a snapshot of how climate change negatively affects the enjoyment of human rights in different contexts, particularly of those who are marginalized, neglected or oppressed.

The “India 2022: An assessment of extreme weather events”, prepared by the Centre for Science and Environment and Down To Earth (CSE/DTE), attempts to build an evidence base on the frequency and expanding geography of extreme weather events in India.