Mapping the Green Transition in Recent Economic Agreements

Key ​​​​​​Messages

​​Governments are increasingly using economic agreements to cooperate on the green transition​​ and enhance economic security and growth, as revealed by IISD’s new Trade & Climate Tracker​​, which analyzed 71 trade and economic deals signed between January 2025​​ and June 2026. ​​​

Of the 46 agreements with published texts:

• 37% of the agreements analyzed, involving 23 parties, include renewable energy provisions—the connective tissue of recent trade deals. This category is not dominated by any single government, but rather the one picked up so consistently by governments that it’s clear renewable energy cooperation is one of the priorities of the global trade agenda.
• Critical minerals cooperation is a strong focus of recent trade deals. Overall, 54% of the deals tracked cover critical minerals (such as lithium, cobalt, copper, and rare earths), which are rapidly becoming a strategic priority for many countries. Most of these agreements are dedicated exclusively to critical minerals, with provisions focused on building value chains in producer countries and on supply chain security partnerships among allies.
• In addition, 59% include broader climate-related provisions, with cooperation on deforestation the single most common climate-related issue, appearing in 24 agreements.
• The United States has been the most active government overall, negotiating 32 out of 71 agreements in the last 18 months, and the majority of its ​agreements contain​ critical minerals provisions (17 out of 25 agreements with provisions on Critical Raw Materials (CRMs)​​ in ​​the​​ period analyzed.​​ It has also been most active on energy cooperation (12 out of 31 agreements) and deforestation issues (9 out of 24 agreements).
• The European Union’s (EU’s) agreements have the most provisions linked to emissions reduction (7 out of 19 agreements with available texts), heavy industry decarbonization and circularity (4 out of 5 in each sub-category), while leading on renewable energy cooperation (6 out of 17).
• India is second only to the  European Union on renewable energy cooperation (five agreements to the EU’s six) and features prominently as the first country to have EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism-related provisions in its flagship EU–India free trade agreement (FTA).

Why Look for Climate Cooperation in Trade Agreements?

Trade deals are no longer only about tariffs. Despite—or perhaps because of—the fragile state of multilateral climate governance, countries are turning to economic cooperation agreements to strengthen and deepen partnerships that go beyond pure trade cooperation to tackle climate change issues. These deals increasingly incorporate support for each other’s green energy transition by securing value chains and enhancing energy cooperation, as well as building the green markets of the future. Governments’ economic priorities increasingly align with the fight against climate change.

This brief presents the first findings from the IISD’s Trade & Climate Tracker (see Figure 1), a new resource that codes recent economic agreements for their green transition content, to show what these deals add up to when read together. IISD’s analysis currently covers 71 binding and non-binding instruments (referred to here collectively as “agreements”) signed between January 2025 and June 2026, and the publicly available texts for 46 of those agreements.

Figure 1. The IISD Trade & Climate Tracker

The trade agreements analyzed by the tool were concluded in 2025 and 2026 and include provisions on access to critical minerals, renewable energy cooperation, combating deforestation, and securing supply chains.

A Busy Space in Trade Diplomacy

2025 and 2026 marked a fast-moving period for trade diplomacy, with a total of 71 agreements signed between 66 governments (Figure 2). The spurt was led by the United States, whose negotiators concluded 32 agreements, followed by the United Arab Emirates (14) and the European Union (9).

FTAs have long been the most prominent form of trade partnership between countries and typically include wide-ranging trade liberalization commitments. However, FTAs increasingly feature ambitious provisions on other aspects of economic cooperation. They are taking on a new role as vehicles for cooperation on climate change issues, spanning energy security, deforestation, and critical minerals.

At the same time, newer forms of cooperation, such as CRM memorandums of understanding (MoUs) (16 tracked agreements) and reciprocal trade agreements (8), are emerging. This trend is strongly led by the United States, which is involved in 95% of the CRM-centric agreements tracked. The rise of high-level issue-specific MoUs alongside more traditional FTAs reflects governments’ desire to move quickly to secure access to raw materials or other key inputs, even if at the expense of legally binding commitments; FTAs are, by design, wide-ranging, legally binding treaties, but take years (sometimes decades) to negotiate.

Figure 2. Signatory network in the Trade and Energy Tracker

Green transition provisions are common but unevenly distributed. Energy is the most frequent topic, appearing in 32 texts of the analyzed agreements.  Climate-related provisions appear in 27 agreements, CRM provisions in 25, and heavy industry provisions in 8 agreements (Table 1). Notably, CRM provisions are nearly as prevalent as energy and climate cooperation provisions, suggesting that mineral sourcing and security are as important to trade negotiations as energy security and climate cooperation. CRM (critical minerals in particular) are used in both renewable energy technologies and digital products more generally, which means that whatever the motivation for securing their supply, doing so can provide benefits to a country’s renewable energy industry.Agreements are not necessarily entirely or even prominently presented as being about climate cooperation, even when it features extensively. They might also incorporate provisions on fossil fuels as part of energy security. The trend, however, is that national priorities, whether national security or economic resilience, appear to be pragmatically converging with cooperation over climate and green industrial policies.

Table 1. Green transition provisions in economic agreements

Energy security and cooperation provisions appear in 31 agreements, roughly twice as many as contain renewable energy provisions (17). This is a clear reflection of the period of high energy insecurity that began with COVID-19, continued with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and has recently escalated due to the conflict between the United States and Iran. This trend suggests that governments are actively using economic agreements to address energy security concerns, with some prioritizing renewable energy within this. The United States signed the most agreements containing energy provisions (12), followed by the European Union (7) and India (5); while on renewable energy specifically, the European Union led with six agreements, followed by India with five (Table 1).

Through climate provisions in their trade agreements, governments often reaffirmed their Paris Agreement commitments, strengthening cooperation on emissions reduction and other joint climate objectives. Among the 27 agreements with climate content, deforestation provisions appear in 24 texts, emissions-related provisions in 19, and other climate cooperation (references to Paris Agreement processes, adaptation, and climate finance) in 18 (Table 1). The United States (9) and the European Union (7) signed the most agreements with climate provisions, and the European Free Trade Association  (comprising of Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland), are parties to five agreements containing climate provisions.

Agreements on CRM cooperation have focused on strengthening supply chain security (25 agreements) and developing the value chain further downstream (20 agreements) (Table 1). The United States dominates this category of agreements, being a party to 17 of the 25 agreements with CRM provisions, followed by the European Union (7) and Japan (3). The United States’ reciprocal trade agreements, for example, require partners such as Indonesia, Cambodia, and Ecuador to allow and facilitate U.S. investment across the full CRM value chain from exploration to refining and export. At the same time, the European Union’s minerals partnerships with the United States and South Africa cover the whole life cycle, including recycling and local value addition in producer countries.

Heavy industry-related cooperation remains a less developed aspect of economic and trade agreements, but one to watch. So far, governments have focused on joint work on decarbonization and circularity. The European Union stands out as the government prioritizing this agenda, including provisions on decarbonization (four agreements) and circularity (four agreements) across the EU–Mercosur agreement, the EU–India FTA, the EU-Australia FTA, and the EU–South Africa Clean Trade and Investment Partnership, while India is party to two agreements containing heavy industry-related provisions.

Emerging Trends

The value of the Trade & Climate Tracker is not only in aggregate counts. It also makes visible concrete stories about how governments are using economic agreements to cooperate on the green transition.

Why This Matters

As trade and economic agreements are becoming an active part of the governance infrastructure of the green transition, tracking such agreements reveals where governments’ priorities lie. It also enables external scrutiny of what has been agreed, and whether what happens on the ground after the ink has dried matches the negotiators’ carefully crafted language of cooperation.