Civil society organisations do not see tackling climate change as relevant to their core work, a Green Alliance report has found.

The New Times, New Connections report conducted desk-based research and interviews of 222 non-environmental organisations to discover how the sector can act to curb climate change without the need for legislation.

Acevo, ActionAid, Christian Aid, CAN and WWF were among the organisations researched in the report which revealed that climate change was low on the priority list for many of the organisations questioned and that there is a "lack of climate literacy" in the sector. 

"Wider civil society organisations have a hugely significant role in tackling climate change and there are real imperatives for a much broader range of organisations to think more strategically about what it means for their work and beneficiaries," said a spokesperson for the Green Alliance.

"It has the potential to roll back progress on a wide range of goals, including efforts to tackle poverty and inequalities and to protect the vulnerable. Once the links are made, the power of civil society organisations to influence decision makers with compelling new perspectives will be invaluable in securing more rapid and ambitious progress on climate change," they added.

"Building climate literacy" will be a priority for the Green Alliance which will explore how to support this as a follow up to the study. 

The report also called for the sector to work together to become better informed and build a wider understanding of the issues around climate change but stated that climate change will be "embedded in civil society efforts to build the big society".

"Smarter funding" will also be needed to differentiate projects aimed at tackling the impact of climate change in its wider sense from those dealing simply with the 'environmental' impact, the report concluded.