The Accord, essentially negotiated between the USA, China, India, Brazil and South Africa, commits nations to taking action to limit future global temperature increases to 2 degrees. Annex 1 nations such as Australia are committed to submitting an emissions reduction target for 2020 by 31st January, 2010. 

Non Annex 1 countries (including the USA, China, Brazil and India) are required to submit a list of mitigation actions that they are prepared to take by 31 January, 2010. Least developed nations and small island states are not required to undertake any actions.

International reaction to the agreement appears to generally be that it represents a weak result for those who anticipated a heroic outcome, and may be at best a stop-gap measure pending some future agreement. The New York Times sees it as a loss for the Europeans, The UK Times seems to blame the USA for the lack of any more commitment to emission reduction, The Times of India saw it as a demonstration of the shift of power away from developed nations to new powers such as China, while the Chinese Peoples Daily focused on the success of the Chinese Premier in insisting China's emission reduction efforts would not be subject to international scrutiny.

Poor conference organisation, and continuing doubts about the impartiality of some of the scientific evidence and modelling associated with climate predictions was also frequently referred to in media commentary as a reason there was not more concrete outcomes.