Global Goals, Local Action: Powering the Transition in the Global South

EMDEs will play a decisive role in the global transition to net zero. Much of the world’s future population growth, urbanisation and infrastructure development will take place across the Global South, driving significant growth in demand for cement and concrete. These materials will be essential to building housing, transport networks, energy infrastructure, industrial facilities and climate-resilient cities. Ensuring that this new infrastructure is built with increasingly low-carbon cement and concrete will therefore be critical to keeping global climate goals within reach.

While global climate goals provide an important direction of travel, there is no single pathway to decarbonisation. The transition must reflect local realities and development needs. The challenge is not just to reduce emissions from existing cement production, but to create the conditions in which low-carbon cement and concrete can become commercially viable and competitive as these markets grow.

The session will focus on:

• Translating global net-zero goals into national decarbonsiation
• Identifying the most effective decarbonisation pathways for different EMDE contexts.
• Scaling commercially available solutions
  The policy frameworks, financing mechanisms and partnerships needed to translate global goals into locally tailored decarbonisation pathways in EMDEs
• How we can better align national climate commitments with cement and concrete decarbonisation pathways while supporting competitiveness, economic development and infrastructure growth