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In this report, Morphosis sets out and illustrates the practical application of an approach to measuring, and so more effectively planning, executing and communicating progress in advancing a ‘whole economy’ approach to transformative adaptation in a world increasingly and severely impacted by climate change. The approach provides an indexed measure of national progress, an initial step that paves the way for a family of sovereign, sub-national, sectoral and asset-level indexes to be developed.

The Adaptation Economy Index builds on the Adaptation Economy Policy Framework developed by a Morphosis-led policy research group including Center for Sustainability Studies at Fundação Getulio Vargas, the Paulson Institute, Instituto Itaúsa and Basilinna, and released in November 2025 in the context of COP30. The Index draws on and offers measures of the Framework’s seven overarching enabling domains, summarised in The Rise of the Adaptation Economy and four associated technical papers including Brazil and China case studies.