Loss and Damage refers to the unavoidable harms from climate change that go beyond what adaptation can prevent or repair. This includes economic losses (destroyed homes, roads, crops, fisheries) and noneconomic losses (lives, cultural heritage, biodiversity, mental health, and displacement). Vulnerable developing countries, especially Least Developed Countries (LDCs), and Small Island Developing States (SIDS) suffer the worst impacts despite contributing the least to emissions. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) provides a useful working distinction, using the capitalized “Loss and Damage” to refer to the political debates and negotiations under the UNFCCC, while the lowercase “loss and damage” describes the actual harm from observed impacts and projected risks of anthropogenic climate change (IPCC, 2022, p. 2914). This harm manifests when the frequency and intensity of climate-related hazards exceed the adaptive capacity of human and natural systems, resulting in consequences that cannot be avoided through mitigation or managed through adaptation efforts (Zommers et al., 2016; Van der Geest & Schindler, 2017).
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