S’pore to focus on adaptation as climate impacts grow, emitters backslide on commitments: Grace Fu

Singapore intensifies its focus on climate adaptation, unveiling new initiatives and a National Adaptation Plan to combat rising seas and extreme heat. Read more at straitstimes.com.

SINGAPORE - Protecting Singapore from climate impacts will be a major focus for the Ministry of Sustainability and the Environment (MSE) in 2026, with a suite of new initiatives to address threats from unbearable heat to rising seas.

These initiatives include girding coastlines against rising sea levels, and strengthening Singapore’s food security, said Minister for Sustainability and the Environment Grace Fu on March 3.

More funds will also be invested into research that will deepen the understanding of how heat affects people and facilitate the development of novel cooling solutions, she added.

Efforts to improve people’s resilience to heat will also be coordinated across the Government, she added during the debate on her ministry’s budget. The FY2026 total expenditure of MSE is projected to be $3.69 billion, down from the $4.21 billion in the 2025 financial year.

Ms Fu said that MSE will be designating 2026 as the Year of Climate Adaptation, and outlined the various initiatives that will be implemented on this front. “It involves a comprehensive review of our adaptation measures across key domains such as heat resilience, coastal and flood resilience, and water and food resilience,” she said.

These measures will be formalised in Singapore’s inaugural National Adaptation Plan – a report that the country aims to publish in 2027. Countries party to the Paris Agreement are obliged to submit these plans to the UN.