Report says climate plan underfunded, unclear

OTTAWA - A report says Canada's climate adaptation strategy is underfunded and does not clearly align its goals with the country's top climate change risks.

The Canadian Climate Institute put out the report that makes 11 recommendations for improvements to the federal government's draft $1.6-billion strategy that was released in November.

It says that while it's good the strategy establishes clear, high-level, priorities like disaster resilience, health and biodiversity, there hasn't been work done to assess which risks are most significant and urgent

The report says Canada's rationale for selecting its proposed targets is unclear and that there should be regular assessments done of top national climate risks so the plan can be updated.

It also found the funding for the action plan is "inadequate," only representing an average annual increase of about $200 million in federal investments in climate change adaptation.

It says Ottawa needs to confirm that more government funding is coming beyond what was announced with the action plan.