The Paris Agreement was signed on December 12, 2015. The agreement is an international treaty within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and was adopted by 196 parties during the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP21) in Paris, France. Its goal is to combat climate change by limiting global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit). The agreement entered into force on November 4, 2016, after being ratified by a sufficient number of countries.