In an era defined by geopolitical conflicts, volatile energy prices, disrupted supply chains, changing trade relationships and intensifying climate impacts, governments need a steady hand that can anchor today’s policy decisions to tomorrow’s goals.Long-term climate strategies offer exactly that — aligning climate and development goals, and the policy and investment tools that support them, in ways that benefit people, nature and the climate. These strategies hold steady through political transitions, helping governments make better near-term choices in service of the future they are aiming to build.Also known as long-term low-emission development strategies (or LT-LEDS), these plans work backward from a long-term goal, such as achieving net-zero emissions, together with development priorities like job creation, energy access and economic growth, to shape the nearer-term decisions that actually get funded, from five-year national climate plans to annual budgets and sector investments. Along the way, these strategies help break down silos within governments and provide the certainty investors need to scale finance.Navigating a Volatile WorldAs Venugopal Mothkoor of NITI Aayog, India’s policy think tank, said at a recent webinar hosted by 2050 is Now, a consortium that supports countries in developing and updating long-term strategies: ‘In a stable environment, long-term strategies are important, but in an unstable world, they are indispensable.’For months, the war on Iran and the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz cut off a quarter of the world’s seaborne oil and a fifth of its liquefied natural gas. The crisis made clear that moving away from fossil fuels is no longer just a climate goal but central to energy security and economic stability — momentum reinforced at the first Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels conference in Santa Marta, Colombia, in April. Yet when countries need to deliver on climate, energy security, economic stability and increasing equality all at once, careful long-term planning becomes even more important.At a time when some countries are pulling back from their climate commitments, countries like India, Ethiopia, South Africa, Australia and France are seizing this moment by advancing their long-term strategies to protect communities, navigate trade-offs, capture economic opportunities and build the resilience that a volatile world demands. Here’s how they’re doing it.2050 is Now Ahead of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP31) in Antalya, Türkiye, 2050 is Now sets out six priorities for the summit.Read the communiqué. Building a Shared Vision Across GovernmentLong-term strategies only deliver when they are owned across government and embedded in economic planning, budgets and sector decisions.For example, Ethiopia aligned implementation across its Climate Resilient Green Economy vision, National Adaptation Plan, long-term strategy and latest national climate plan with its 10-year development plan, which is put together by mainstream planning institutions. Together, these plans guide national policymaking, so climate goals are built into the country’s development priorities rather than treated as a separate agenda.’If climate change is not integrated in development planning and budget discussions, as well as sectoral and macroeconomic reforms, then it will remain a paper ambition,’ Abas Mohammed, CEO of Climate Change Policy and Action in Ethiopia’s Ministry of Planning and Development, said during the 2050 is Now webinar. ‘And paper ambition does not protect farmers, cities or public finances.’Ethiopia’s recent ban on gas-powered vehicle imports illustrates of how this alignment works in practice when multiple ministries can support implementation of a new policy. The plan was put forward by the Ministry of Transport and Logistics in coordination with the Ministry of Finance and the Councils of Ministers as promoting a transition to electric vehicles and also as a financial policy, saving billions on fuel imports. For a country aligned on climate and development goals across its government, this kind of cohesion comes naturally. A busy street in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The country’s recent ban on imports of gas-powered vehicles demonstrates how different parts of the government can support policies that align climate and development plans. Photo by Bazigala Derrick/iStock. Ownership must also extend beyond government. Paseka Mabina, director for climate change mitigation research and analysis at South Africa’s Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, argue that strategies are most robust when they include diverse stakeholders — including vulnerable groups — from the very start, as these strategies affect livelihoods, communities and local economies.In updating its long-term strategy, South Africa developed eight narratives to explore what it means to have a ‘good life’ and to show how the country can address poverty, inequality, unemployment, adaptation and decarbonization together. These were developed by government experts as well as civil society, think tanks, organized labor, industry and academics. This approach has the potential to make South Africa’s climate and development plans more socially acceptable and durable, and sets an example other countries can learn from.Translating a National Vision Into Sectoral PathwaysA national goal only becomes real when broken into sector-specific transitions with clear milestones, ownership and timelines. The following examples show how long-term strategies can help tackle the practical obstacles that stand between ambition and delivery.France’s 2026 Roadmap for Transitioning away from Fossil Fuels is among the most explicit recent examples. Built on the National Low-Carbon Strategy and Multiannual Energy Planning, it plans to phase out coal dependence by 2030, oil by 2045 and fossil gas by 2050, with interim goals to cut fossil fuels’ share of final energy consumption to 40% by 2030 and 30% by 2035. Paired with concrete measures — transport electrification, building renovation, heat pump deployment, fossil-fuel boiler phaseouts — it moves from broad intention to operational choices across sectors with very different investment cycles.Australia’s Net Zero Plan sets out an overarching pathway supported by six sector plans, each co-led by the relevant ministry, and underpinned by the same economic modeling and analysis undertaken by the Australian Treasury. That ownership embeds climate objectives in the decisions of those responsible for energy, industry, transport, agriculture, environment, housing and regional development.It also surfaces practical barriers. For example, lead times for renewable energy projects were up to seven years for onshore wind and up to six years for large-scale solar, which deterred investment and eroded community trust. Surfacing this core challenge through the plan enabled it to be addressed as part of recent environmental protection reforms.As a result, the government allocated over 70 million Australian dollars ($48.8 million) this year to deliver faster project approvals in collaboration with local and regional governments, alongside more streamlined processes for other priority areas like housing and critical minerals, while at the same time strengthening environmental protections. A solar farm is set up on a rooftop in Adelaide, Australia. The country is now allocating millions of dollars to speed up renewable project timelines. Photo by moisseyev/iStock. Navigating Trade-Offs and Leveraging SynergiesA credible long-term strategy surfaces the difficult trade-offs of the green transition early and builds a practical agenda to meet multiple goals at once.For many developing and emerging economies, the central question is how to decarbonize while expanding energy access, growing industry and raising living standards. India starts with development at its core. ‘For us, development is a goal, and we’re not going to talk about net zero without development,’ Mothkoor of NITI Aayog said. That stance shapes India’s choices: The country is deploying very large-scale renewables and storage alongside nuclear power to meet a threefold increase in electricity demand.Coal will inevitably need to be phased down in the country, but it remains part of the near-term energy mix because long-duration storage is not yet commercially competitive at the required scale. Acknowledging that trade-off makes the strategy more credible, and it points to where significant research and investment are still needed to tip the scales away from using coal as a viable resource.Credible long-term planning also anticipates volatility and builds it into the plan. For India, that means electrifying the economy with domestically generated renewable power, reducing exposure to sudden spikes in imported fossil fuel prices. But it raises another question — How can the country avoid swapping fossil-fuel dependency for critical-mineral dependency? India’s answer combines domestic exploration and processing with diversified partnerships across Australia, Africa and Latin America, which may also help build competitiveness in green technologies.Australia’s long-term planning centers on sequencing the transition. Economic analysis identified where rapid action is efficient — electricity and energy efficiency — and where transitions will take longer, such as transport, housing, heavy industry and agriculture. The result: lay foundations early in the sectors where asset turnover takes decades, and act fastest where returns come quickly.In housing, for example, where building design decisions have a decades-long impact, the government has improved energy efficiency standards for new homes in the National Construction Code and recently launched a national home energy rating system to help people make informed decisions about existing homes, reduce their energy bills and improve the comfort and safety of their homes. New homes being constructed in Melbourne, Australia. The country’s long-term strategy includes updated energy efficient standards for new homes. Photo by Alena Levykin/Shutterstock. France’s roadmap shows how climate and energy security goals can reinforce each other. Fossil fuels supply less than 60% of its energy consumption, but nearly 95% of them are imported. That makes the transition both a national security priority and a pathway to guaranteeing its long-term energy sovereignty.Reskilling Workers and Supporting CommunitiesPlans that ignore the people and places tied to high-carbon industries risk economic inequality and political backlash. South Africa is deliberately including workers, municipalities, informal livelihoods, youth, women and poor households in transition design — and grounding strategies territorially, because regions experience the transition differently. As Mabina, from South Africa’s Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, explained, ‘The real question is not only how ambitious we are, but how well we manage the labor market shift.South Africa’s latest modeling suggests net-zero pathways can create jobs in electricity, construction and services. But the opportunity requires active labor-market policies and investments in reskilling, social protection and localized pilots that can scale — with transitions shaped together with workers from the start. Similarly, modeling for Ethiopia indicates a net-zero pathway could add 672,000 green jobs, relative to business as usual, while also increasing disposable incomes for people.Aligning Finance and Creating Bankable PipelinesA long-term plan without an aligned finance strategy remains conceptual. Public budgets cannot fund deep structural transitions alone; governments must deploy domestic and international public resources efficiently and reform policies and institutions to mobilize domestic and international private finance at scale.Ethiopia shows how domestic commitment signals seriousness to partners: It has committed roughly 22.5% from its domestic resources to implement its national climate plan, including a Green Legacy and Degraded Land Special Fund supported by about 1% of the annual budget — seed funding that, alongside strong policies, pipelines and structures, could be critical to mobilizing additional support.India’s needs illustrate the scale of the challenge: Current energy investment runs about $130 billion per year against transition needs closer to $500 billion — $22.7 trillion cumulatively by 2070. Investors, Mothkoor noted, look for three things: a strategy that sets direction, a taxonomy that clarifies priorities and a pipeline of bankable projects.India is responding by segmenting finance by technology maturity — deployment mechanisms for solar and wind, blended finance and demand creation for green hydrogen and carbon capture, innovation finance for earlier-stage technologies — and exploring a green finance institution to pool and leverage capital from sovereign wealth funds and multilateral development banks. Wind turbines seen from the road are part of the Kudankulam Wind Farm, in Tamil Nadu, India, next to the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant. The wind farm is among the largest in the country and part of an effort to help meet increasing energy demand. Photo by Parimita Krishna/iStock. The Decisions That Need to Be Made Right NowLong-term strategic planning sets a clear direction of travel and builds the institutional capacity to navigate the transition in a way that works for people. That is also what makes strategies last. Policies endure through political cycles when they lower costs, create jobs and strengthen resilience.Left as only a formal submission to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, disconnected from real decision-making, long-term climate strategies deliver very little. As Australia, Ethiopia, France, India and South Africa show, these strategies are only as valuable as how they’re put into practice. Treated as living documents — embedded in economic planning, sector decisions, budgets and investment pipelines — they become one of the most powerful tools a government has to navigate the geopolitical volatility it faces right now.Ahead of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP31) in Antalya, Türkiye, this November, the 2050 is Now consortium has released a communiqué calling on the summit to advance long-term climate and development planning through six core priorities. These include formally recognizing new and updated long-term strategies, aligning finance and international cooperation behind them, and urging countries to keep revising them as political, economic and energy conditions change.