The UN Convention aims to stabilise greenhouse gas emissions at "a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system". The treaty literally states that "such a level should be achieved within a time frame sufficient to allow ecosystems to adapt naturally to climate change".

Industrialised countries, referred to in Annex 1, emit the most greenhouse gases and are expected to make the greatest effort. They are required to reduce their emissions to 1990 levels by 2000 and to monitor their emissions annually with 1990 as the reference year.

Belgium is an Annex I country.

Countries that sign the treaty are called "Parties". From this point onwards, a climate summit called Conference of the Parties (COP) is organised every year.

The operationalisation of the UNFCC will be done through the Kyoto Protocol (1997). This Protocol has two commitment periods: 2008-2012 and 2013-2020.

The Convention was the first agreement to require countries to measure and record their greenhouse gas emissions in "greenhouse gas inventories".

The Convention requires Parties to periodically report their greenhouse gas inventories to the UNFCCC and to communicate their national policies as part of their "national communications".

In the UNFCCC, the Parties agree to draft and publish climate plans. These plans were the forerunners of the current National Energy and Climate Plans (see 2021).

The UNFCC states that lack of scientific evidence should not be used as a reason for delaying action to address climate change.

The UNFCC only talks about stabilising greenhouse gas concentrations at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system. At that time, there was no sufficient scientific basis to set a quantitative target. It is only 17 years later, in the Copenhagen Accord (2009), that the upper limit of +2°C is officially mentioned as a global objective.