- Mayors unite behind the call for bold climate action ahead of COP30
- Brazil’s spirit of mutirão inspires global collaboration and innovation
- Cities showcase real solutions delivering climate justice, finance, and resilience
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (4 November 2025) – As the C40 World Mayors Summit enters its second day, city leaders from every continent will showcase how mayors are not only delivering climate action at home but helping to shape the global agenda ahead of COP30, setting out their call to action as to what must come next.
Under the theme “Mutirão in Motion: Cities Leading the Way to COP30,” today’s events and announcements will celebrate the collective energy of the mutirão – Brazil’s tradition of communities joining forces to build solutions – and reflect how this spirit defines the country’s COP30 Presidency.
The afternoon plenary will spotlight the Coalition for High Ambition Multilevel Partnerships (CHAMP) – launched at COP28 and now embraced by 77 countries – as a breakthrough model for climate federalism.
Brazil’s Minister of Cities, Jader Barbalho Filho, will address delegates on this theme, explaining how cooperation between national and subnational governments is being embedded in Brazil’s climate plans.
This will be backed up by further major announcements demonstrating how Latin America’s, and especially Brazil’s, cities are leading by example:
- The Global Methane Hub will announce a $10 million investment to help Latin American and Caribbean cities cut methane from waste, building on the success of C40’s Sustainable Waste Systems Accelerator. Together, these initiatives will demonstrate how mayors are delivering tangible solutions aligned with COP30’s focus on implementation, inclusion, and innovation.
- C40 and UN-Habitat will also launch the new Urban Planning Accelerator, a political commitment to integrate climate and equity into city master plans whilst ensuring development is compact, connected, and nature-positive. 30 mayors from cities around the world have joined the accelerator, including 3 from Brazil and 9 from across Latin America.
- The C40 Cities Finance Facility will announce the 4 Global South cities that are set to receive support to turn their ambitious climate plans into tangible, finance-ready infrastructure projects. These include flood prevention in Belo Horizonte, a new passenger ferry network in Cartagena, solar-powered e-buses in Rabat, and green regeneration projects in São Paulo.
These actions, and the actions of the hundreds of cities represented across the World Mayors Summit, are only possible with a sustained commitment to funding climate action. This will be a key message mayors will take forward to Belém: scaling up urban climate finance is a global priority and must be a key outcome of the COP30 process.
C40 Cities and the Global Covenant of Mayors (GCoM) mayors are calling for the ‘Baku-to-Belém Roadmap to $1.3 trillion’ to recognise cities and subnational governments as key partners, and to mobilise public and private investment to cities, states, and regions, especially in the Global South.
Mobilising public and private finance to subnationals has already proved successful in Latin America, where new figures from the Zero Emission Bus Rapid-deployment Accelerator (ZEBRA) Partnership, which tracks the growth of electric mobility across Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Mexico, show investment in electric bus fleets has surged to US$4.3 billion.
Meanwhile, C40 Cities, supported by the International Finance Corporation and the International Association of Ports and Harbors, will announce a first-of-its-kind partnership to drive port decarbonisation through innovative sustainable finance mechanisms. The new Global Port Sustainability-Linked Loan initiative will target $1 billion in green maritime infrastructure investment within three years, with a focus on Global South ports. The partnership will help address a $200 billion sustainability-linked financing gap for infrastructure in the maritime sector
The day will conclude with a closing address from C40 Co-Chair and Mayor of London Sadiq Khan, who is expected to say: “It’s been an incredible, inspiring two days full of ideas and optimism.
“No doubt, we’ve all felt a collective surge of energy, enthusiasm, and determination. And I’m more convinced than ever that our cities can make the difference in bringing our climate under control…and in building a fairer, safer and brighter future for all.
“Because from London to Lagos, Beijing to Bogota, Dhaka to Accra, it’s cities that are stepping up. Taking the bold action this moment demands of us. And finding innovative ways not just to reduce our carbon emissions, but to increase the opportunities available to our citizens.
“But we’re at an inflection point. Across the world, national politicians and policymakers have two options. They can choose the fruits and the gift of a green economy. Or they can choose to condemn our societies to disastrous fossil fuel dependency.
“It’s a choice between clean air or more toxic pollution. A choice between protecting nature or defiling it. Between security and prosperity, or climate chaos and volatility.”
Meanwhile, in his keynote address Mayor of Rio, Eduardo Paes, is expected to say: “It brings me a great sense of pride to see our largest World Mayors Summit ever kick-starting this year’s COP.
“It also brings me great joy to see how much C40 has grown – and how it continues to support mayors across the globe in committing to climate action, reducing emissions, and building more resilient and sustainable cities.
“C40 cities are reducing per capita emissions five times faster than the global average – and most of them have been continuously cutting emissions year after year. Together, we have created over twenty-one million good green jobs and implemented more than two hundred thousand mitigation and adaptation actions.
“So, it’s clear to me: city leadership…can help shift COPs from negotiation to delivery. And it is for this reason that we call for greater inclusion of cities and subnational governments in the COP process – not as guests, but as true partners. To the world leaders gathering in Belém: local leadership is ready to join you in a true global mutirão – working side by side to turn ambition into action, and promises into progress.”