A global push to make culture central to climate action is gaining momentum ahead of COP30 in Belém, Brazil.

With several planetary bounds breached, the impacts of climate change reach every aspect of our lives including cultural heritage, both tangible and intangible. Rising sea levels, successive droughts, torrential rains, and wildfires not only impact the built heritage - deteriorating the materials, but also affect the natural and cultural landscapes and ecosystems. These severe weather events alter the ways people live and work, while weakening the connections that communities maintain with their history, traditions, and sense of place. As cultural centres, cities boast great potential for protecting their cultural heritage and local identities, whilst defending against climate change.

ICLEI Member Metropool Regio Amsterdam (MRA) shows how the arts and culture sector can be a pillar of urban climate action; the city has included the arts and culture sector in its environmental planning, introducing a sustainable events policy for festivals larger than 2000 attendees, offering environmental audits and training to cultural venues, and providing grants for energy efficiency improvement to venues.

Culture, art and heritage helps us to reimagine our cities, and breathe new purpose into shared spaces. In ICLEI Member Barcelona, for instance, culture reinforces the value of environmentally conscious city planning. Barcelona’s superblocks embed climate resilience and adaptation into the design of the public spaces, and allow for pedestrian-friendly mobility. The multifunctional and car-free space becomes an accessible site for cultural activities, turning neighbourhoods into community-oriented and vibrant locations.

At MONDIACULT2025, recently held in Barcelona, ICLEI Europe joined partners in the European Heritage Hub, to adopt the Barcelona Declaration, which calls for placing culture at the centre of global climate action. Ahead of COP30, the Declaration reaffirms the political commitment of global actors to accelerate climate action through culture, aimed at enhancing adaptation plans, reducing sectoral emissions, and establishing culturally sensitive pathways to climate change mitigation.

The movement is building on the momentum of the Climate Heritage Network’s first global call, launched in 2023, to urge policymakers to integrate culture, heritage and creativity into climate strategies. The We Make Tomorrow campaign, endorsed by ICLEI, is now uniting artists, activists, designers and heritage stewards to make culture a core pillar of global climate policy. As part of the Global Mutirão platform to mobilise worldwide climate action, cultural organisations, museums, festivals, networks, communities and collectives in more than 100 countries have engaged to make their voice and work recognised in formal policy processes. We Make Tomorrow demands that culture-driven policy be prioritised at COP30 so that societies can learn, connect and transform.

In lockstep with this goal, the Heritage Adapts to Climate Alliance campaign, of which ICLEI is also a part, is similarly geared towards strengthening climate policy. The campaign aims to include culture in key climate decisions ensuring that cultural rights, community knowledge systems, creativity and heritage are central to a just and equitable transition.

With these commitments gaining traction, culture can take on a greater role in our cities and regions to inspire and transform climate action. Join the movement here.