Author: Ayse Kaya Orloff

Multilateral Development Banks and Climate Finance: More Words Than Action

Originally published on the SDG Knowledge Hub, a project by the International Institute for Sustainable Development. Shared here with permission from author.

By Dr. Ayse Kaya, Professor, Swarthmore College; Adjunct Professor, The Wharton School

Multilateral development banks (MDBs) dispense concessional and non-concessional funding for development to low- and middle-income countries. A growing obstacle in the way of development and poverty-reduction is climate change’s adverse impacts. In this context, the World Bank and its peer regional institutions, such as the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the African Development Bank (AfDB), have an increasingly important role to play in channeling their financial resources for climate-related projects in member countries. Yet, they are lagging behind in the provision of multilateral climate finance and need to become more transparent and rigorous in their extant approaches.

Like other forms of climate finance, multilateral financial flows can help developing countries undertake low-carbon growth paths and reduce their emissions, while advancing their ability to resist the current impacts of climate change, namely facilitating adaptation and resilience. The World Bank, for instance, mentions the desire to deliver clean energy – where electricity is currently lagging – to facilitate green growth. Adaptation takes on different forms, but often requires expensive interventions, such as the building of new, more climate-resistant infrastructure. Thus, there is a great need for money, especially for the most vulnerable communities within the most impacted but poor pockets of countries.

MDBs possess great potential to lead in climate finance: they have capital at their disposal and can raise additional money through international markets. For example, the main lending arms of the World Bank, the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and the International Development Association (IDA), had committed a total of over 40 billion USD in fiscal year 2021 (as of July 2022). Aware of their own role in climate finance, MDBs have released joint reports on their climate finance flows since 2011. They have additionally published a joint assessment framework for complying with the 2015 Paris Agreement, in which they have sketched out project activities regarded as “Paris-aligned” versus non-aligned. Many MDB reports also contain numerous references to the SDGs.

More Data, More Money

Alas, this combination of capacity-to-lead and self-professed desire to do so, have not translated into adequate action. MDBs’ efforts to fulfill their potential in climate finance are plagued by a lack of transparently tracked, detailed data and lagging financial commitments.

The MDBs’ joint reports include aggregate numbers on what each bank committed (in the past) as climate finance. However, there is no project-level dataset available to accompany these reports. Such a dataset is essential for others to hold these institutions accountable – without knowing how their flows for climate change are precisely being accounted for, we have to take the MDBs for their word. In national contexts where external financing can easily be diverted to new ends or wasted through corruption, this transparency is doubly important for both national actors and international observers.  

Even when we take the joint reports at their face value, however, the pattern that emerges suggests that MDBs have significant room to ratchet up their ambition in disbursing climate finance. The rich countries’ original promise at the 2009 Copenhagen climate summit (UNFCCC COP15) was for “USD 30 billion for the period 2010-2012 with balanced allocation between adaptation and mitigation” and then USD 100 billion annually by 2020 (emphasis added). The increase in MDBs’ finance from 2013 to 2020 has been unimpressive and bumpy: MDB climate finance only rose to USD 40 billion in 2018 and has since fallen to USD 35 billion in 2020. Further, in the same period, MDBs’ total climate finance remained less than one-third of total MDB operations.

This is particularly true for money for adaptation; most of the world’s poor live in areas most affected by climate change, and their lives remain dependent on activities that are disproportionately influenced by environmental shocks and degradation. Adaptation remains severely unfunded relative to mitigation, with MDBs generally committing close to two-thirds of the climate funds to mitigation and only one-third to adaptation. This asymmetric allocation toward mitigation should be rectified. Further, the concessional share of these multilateral flows remains relatively low: it has been consistently below 50% of total climate financing. This raises questions about multilateral climate finance adding to the debt burden, thereby defeating the purpose of bolstering capacity particularly for adaptation in the developing world.

What does increased ambition on the part of MDBs look like? For example, the World Bank should formally commit a significant share of its lending to climate-related activities and publicly announce a rigorous metric for designating the contribution of projects to this end. Additionally, the temptation to provide mitigation finance to the small emitters should be tamed: mitigation monies are praised for their contribution to global public goods, but save for the large emerging economies, the “adding the drops in the bucket” approach of many small mitigation projects in poor countries will fail to effectively reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. To be sure, the existing governance structures of MDBs may hamper their ability to boost multilateral climate finance. These banks tend to be top shareholder-driven, which means the key players need to converge on amping up MDBs’ climate finance.

New Oversight Committee for Climate Finance

These considerations also suggest that there could be a role for an MDB Climate Finance Oversight Committee, whose members could include technical experts and national and international representatives. While it is still incumbent on MDBs themselves to ramp up ambition in climate finance, such a committee could provide valuable guidance and support MDBs in:

• Making sure only strictly climate and environment-related funds are counted as climate finance. For example, MDBs’ general support for economic development, such as in strengthening education, should not count toward their climate finance goals;
• Overseeing that these flows do not add to the debt burden; and
• Reaching the most vulnerable populations within most vulnerable countries.
• Publishing an open database of detailed project-level data on climate- and environment-related projects pursued by the MDBs.

Since taking development seriously requires taking climate change seriously, by increasing their role in multilateral climate finance, MDBs can demonstrate the necessary institutional adaptation to fulfill their mandates.

This article was written for a Perry World House workshop on Global Climate Finance, held on 3 October 2022 in partnership with the Climate Center of the Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Initiative at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. This workshop was made possible in part by a generous grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The views expressed in this article are solely the author’s and do not reflect those of Perry World House, Wharton School, the University of Pennsylvania, or the Carnegie Corporation of New York.

The author acknowledges Swarthmore’s Joel Dean fund and thanks her students, Sky Park and Kendall Praitis Hill, for their excellent research assistance.

By Matthew Neils’ 22 and Ghazi Randhawa ‘22

Hi Everyone, COP26 ended today on a historic note. In spite of its shortcomings, COP26 should go down in history as a breakthrough COP as a lot of countries have shifted their stances and offered compromises for the sake of avoiding a dystopian future. In this flurry of shifting media cycles on every big and small announcement from COP26, we decided to write about an important net-zero pledge made by a very important developing country that has frequently expressed reluctance on climate commitments: India’s pledge for net-zero GEG emissions by 2070.

The recent report by Climate Action Tracker (CAT) shows that the world will likely miss its target to restrict the global average temperature to well below 2℃, let alone the 1.5 degree Celsius by 2050. With the new pledges in the previous week of the COP26, CAT found that the world would rise to be about 2.4 degree Celsius by the middle of this century. Moreover, the current plans against climate change have been criticized for setting very short term goals which would not prevent increases in temperatures above 1.5 degree Celsius.

While developed countries have been rightfully criticized for pushing our shared world to this brink of collapse and low-income, developing, and island countries have been highlighted as the primary victims of the crisis, the rapidly emerging economic giants of BRICs have had an evolving and contentious role in international negotiations surrounding climate action. Their sheer economic growth and rising greenhouse gas emissions are generated by the need to lift their population out of poverty. This need for growth is coupled with their vulnerability to climate change. China and India present an exacerbated version of issues that arise in climate action by emerging economies: a huge growing population, rapid economic growth at the expense of environmental concerns, and extreme vulnerability to climate change induced alterations in the functioning of their earth systems. Their share of the total greenhouse gas emissions has been steadily increasing since the start of 1990s. Yet, their per-capita emissions of GEGs are still quite low in comparison to developed countries that have markedly higher GEG emissions per capita.

Developed countries have long stressed the trade-off between climate action and development opportunities. This stance is contentious and has led to failure of previous climate action agreements like the Kyoto protocol’s ratification in the US. In view of the evolving science and economics behind climate change, there is a growing consensus that economic development in these countries should not follow the Kuznets curve perspective. The Kuznets curve implies that countries’ tolerance for levels of environmental degradation has a trade-off with development that eventually reaches a peak. After that point, the country’s preference for environmental degradation goes down even as further economic growth occurs and this leads to environmental cleanup. Many countries have shown development and environmental patterns on lines of the Kuznets curve with the most recent example being China. However, with the burgeoning scientific literature on climate change, experience with development strategies, and breakthrough scientific developments, there has been a growing recognition for the dispelling these cycles of development economics and a call for sustainable low-carbon development pathways.

Historically, India has been part of the G77 group in global climate negotiations. Since the first UNFCCC conference in 1992, India’s economy has grown rapidly along with its aggregate carbon emissions and per capita emissions. If corrective action is not taken, India is expected to join the club of countries who single-handedly contribute the most to fueling the climate crisis. Of the four largest emitters (China, the United States, the European Union, and India), India was previously the only emerging economy not to have made a net-zero commitment. As recently as a month before the COP26, India shirked its responsibility for climate action. India’s (coupled with China’s) earlier reluctance for climate action has led to breakdown in negotiations at earlier climate conferences. While India has agreed to the principle of Common But Differentiated Responsibility, it has been reluctant to make a net-zero pledge for many reasons.

Firstly, India has been a vocal advocate for the right of developing countries to pursue their development plans. India has instead laid the onus of climate action on developed countries who caused the problem. It has repeatedly pointed to the fact that its per-capita emissions are lower than many developed countries who have caused the problem of climate change. India is a rapidly developing huge country which is not expected to reach its peak population and economy for a long time. India has relied on fast and massive economic growth rates to pull swathes of its population out of poverty. To summarize, India has long believed that it has a lot to lose from climate action which it believes would hinder its economic development strategy. However, new breakthroughs in science about climate change have led to serious concerns about the short term and long term sustainability of any carbon based development in any country. India is no exception to this insight and its vulnerability to climate change has impacted its view on climate change.

Secondly, India has frequently objected to the ‘net-zero’ framing of climate action. Net-zero commitments are often criticized for being hollow pledges in that they do not commit to decreasing carbon emissions. India has instead been more active in pledging better carbon intensity targets for its economy. Carbon-intensity targets aim to increase the efficiency of carbon emissions for running the economy. Carbon-intensity targets are touted by India as a more pragmatic measure of climate action than net-zero pledges. Net-zero emissions have also been recently criticized for being too long-term and not doing enough to prevent extreme climate change in the short term(more than 1.5 degree Celsius by middle of the century). Moreover, the number of countries making net-zero pledges has grown vastly over the past few years and India has been facing pressure to join the club. Moreover, we think that the goals of net-zero and carbon intensity should go hand in hand in development policies. Just committing to increased carbon intensity or net-zero pledges alone would not ameliorate the problem of aggregate emissions of India.

Thirdly, India has been reluctant to cooperate in view of unfulfilled pledges for climate finance. It is a known fact that developed countries largely failed to fulfill their pledges for immediate and long term climate finance they agreed to in the Paris agreement of 2016. This pattern of repeated failure by developed countries in provision of climate finance has caused a trust vacuum. Why should developing countries keep giving leeway and ratchet up their commitments to climate action when developed countries keep on failing to deliver on their promised action? COP26 saw increased activity and relatively more solid commitments and pledges over climate finance. Moreover, we think that climate finance is a thorny issue and its best possible resolution would still be far from the perfect version that many developing countries would want. It should not hold back India in driving up its ambition in climate action and emissions pledges because there is no other option around climate change.

Last Monday, India joined the other major emitters in a neutrality commitment with Prime Minister Modi’s announcement of new climate goals. This announcement represents a major break from the country’s reluctance to make a net-zero goal. Less than a week before the beginning of COP26, India’s minister of the environment expressed skepticism over the value of neutrality commitments. In light of this reluctance, The new ambitions have three main pillars:

The headline goal is for net-zero emissions by 2070. This date is 10 years behind China’s goal of 2060, and 20 years behind the American and European goals of 2050. It also falls behind global calls for net-zero emissions by 2050 in order to keep warming under 1.5 ℃. Although 2070 falls behind this goal, policymakers have indicated that later deadlines among low and middle income countries can be consistent with remaining below 1.5 ℃ of warming if wealthy countries achieve neutrality before 2050. Indeed, increased pressure on wealthy countries is part of India’s climate strategy. Their minister of the environment has highlighted the importance not only of when a country reaches neutrality, but how much they emit before they reach that point, calling attention to the major contributions of wealthy nations and China to global emissions before they reach net zero.

Additionally, Modi made a number of promises concerning the energy sector: an increase in non-fossil fuel generated energy, achieving half renewable energy generation by 2030. There is doubt about whether India can successfully fulfill these commitments given its history with similar goals. For example, the country had a previously-stated goal of 175 GW of renewable energy generation by 2022, but its capacity currently stands at roughly 100 GW and the country is not on track to reach its goal. The new commitment is for 500 GW of capacity by 2030, an even more ambitious increase. Additionally, coal is an important part of both India’s power generation and its economy more generally, with coal mining and coal energy generation accounting for roughly 10% of the country’s Index of Industrial Production. This reliance makes a shift to renewable energy especially politically and economically challenging. India’s attempts to remove language supporting a phase-out of coal from today’s COP26 deal further reinforce this concern.

Finally, the country aims to cut its carbon dioxide emissions by 1 billion tons (compared to business as usual emissions) by 2030 and has raised its carbon intensity reduction goal from 35% to 45%. While these new goals are among the most ambitious announcements to come out of COP26, and the new climate aspirations are an encouraging sign, they may not be enough. In light of the Climate Action Tracker report, India, like other large economies, needs even more ambitious climate goals in order to keep warming below desired thresholds. Climate Action Tracker rates the new plan “Insufficient” (up from a previous rating of “Highly Insufficient”) due to the lack of concrete policy details and the fact that the enhanced pledge still does not place India on track to keep warming under 2 ℃.

Even with these doubts and limitations, India’s commitment is certainly ambitious, and is a noted improvement on previous climate goals and projections. At the very least, the plan represents a major ratcheting up of climate ambition when compared to India’s previous reluctance, and may provide an impetus for similar aspirations in other countries and sectors. If successful, India would achieve a major energy transition in a country currently reliant on coal and oil that could provide both motivation and practical guidance for other low and middle income countries seeking to make similar transitions. The announcement from a previously reluctant party also places political pressure on other large countries such as the United States, Brazil, and China to enhance their mitigation efforts and may have spurred some of the later commitments from these parties at COP26.

As highlighted by Modi and the Indian delegation, much of the success of the plan is incumbent on the delivery of appropriate levels of climate finance. Even with opportunities for technology transfer and leapfrogging that could allow for low-income pathways to neutrality, such a transition is expensive, and requires major up-front investments that can be difficult to finance. Additionally, climate finance is an important area to support environmental equity. While India is a major net emitter, its per-capita emissions remain far below those of wealthier countries. Therefore, expectations of major emissions reductions without proper support from these countries are both financially unfeasible and do not properly align with climate liability and responsibility.

India’s net-zero goals thematically align well with much of the other news coming out of COP26. They are a definite improvement over previous business-as-usual attitudes, but there are serious concerns about implementation and they remain insufficient to meet more ambitious climate goals. The way that they will be most effective is if pressure is put on other countries such as the United States not only to support low and middle income climate transitions, but to similarly ratchet up ambitions for domestic energy transitions. As climate-conscious citizens it is important to promote the messaging that commitments such as India’s are not an end-solution to the climate crisis, but rather a positive acceleration of climate ambitions that must continue in order to avoid the most harmful outcomes.

By M. Ghazi Randhawa’ 22 & Matthew Neils’ 22

World leaders pledge to halt and reverse deforestation: A cause for celebration?

Hello from Swarthmore! In addition to the excellent coverage of the COP26 proceedings from Alicia, Daniel, and Melissa this week, we are hoping to provide some analysis of the news coming out of the conference from a Swarthmore perspective. Given the attention that it has garnered, the magnitude of the agreement, and the obvious relevance of forest health to us on our arboretum campus, the landmark commitment to ending and reversing deforestation seems a fitting place to start.

Even when surrounded by them, we sometimes take for granted the enormous impact that trees have on global carbon accounting. Stable forests act as massive carbon sinks, sequestering CO2 from the atmosphere. New research estimates that global forests absorb on net 1.5 times the total carbon emissions of the United States each year. However, this carbon does not disappear; when forests are cleared or burned, it is released back into the atmosphere. Indeed, of the world’s three largest rainforests, only the Congo Basin remains a solid carbon sink. Deforestation has a double impact; it stops potential carbon-uptake of the forest and releases carbon that was stored there.

In light of these impacts, representatives of 133 countries covering as much as 85 percent of the forests in the world and at least 30 corporations have signed an agreement committing to stop deforestation by 2030 and make efforts to reverse it. In addition to reaffirming Paris agreement goals of ending deforestation in developing countries, the agreement contains roughly $19 billion in financial commitments to reforestation projects in developing countries and promises to provide remuneration to indigenous people to acknowledge their role as custodians of forests.

Despite the newsworthy nature of this agreement, many experts and activists are skeptical of its ability to create meaningful and lasting differences in deforestation practices. Much of this doubt stems from previous failures of similar agreements. Of particular salience among critics is the 2014 New York Declaration on Forests, a voluntary commitment to halve deforestation by 2020 and eliminate it by 2030. Originally heralded as an impressive step forward, with over 200 signatory countries, multinational corporations, indigenous leaders, and non-governmental organizations, the retrospective story of the agreement has largely been one of disappointment.

The ambitious 2014 commitment was followed by a general lack of published mitigation targets, and the countries that did create targets were unambitious. Indeed, the 2019 five-year report of the project carried the subtitle “A Story of Large Commitments yet Limited Progress.” The data indicate that this assessment may actually have been overly positive; a 2020 report of progress on deforestation goals found, “an average of 41 percent more [tropical primary forest] loss each year after [the agreement] was signed than before.” Needless to say, the 2020 goal of halving deforestation was not met. The Declaration on Forests followed a pattern that many observers of global climate governance are only too familiar with; a promising initiative is introduced at a conference, but national-level financial, administrative, and political follow up is insufficient to achieve its goals.

Despite these past experiences, there is good reason to believe that the new agreement has both new magnitude and a new approach that give it the opportunity to break the pattern of disappointing deforestation commitments and achieve a more meaningful impact. The most important feature of success has been the inclusion of Brazil, Russia and China in this declaration, countries who had not signed onto previous agreements on deforestation. The inclusion of China has large potential for impact because its growing economy has been driving major deforestation in fringe forested areas like Pacific island countries. Similarly, Brazil has been witnessing unprecedented deforestation in the past decade, so its commitments are a good signal.

Secondly, the increased finance for protecting the forests is a necessary attempt to fix the distributive consequences in developing countries of stopping deforestation. Deforestation has immediate benefits for the local communities while ending deforestation has long-term global benefits. Larger financial commitments are an important step in addressing distributive consequences, fostering local support for reforestation measures, and supporting front-line communities. It is the first step to set up a system that works for everyone.

Thirdly, there has been a marked increase in the provision of philanthropic financial commitments by private actors like Jeff Bezos. This shows the growing awareness and perceived urgency of climate action amongst non-state actors. This should be encouraged and shows there is great potential for raising funds for certain oft-overlooked causes of climate action. The inclusion of pledges by at least 30 corporations to cut out products like coffee that drive deforestation in developing countries is a very important and much needed step to halt this blatant exploitation of forests in the developing world. In countries like Brazil, industrial sources of deforestation vastly outnumber the local population’s demand for deforestation.

However, let us not paint too much of a rosy picture of the massively grim state of forests. No international agreement on controversial issues plays out as effectively as it was intended and that is why we see a constant evolution of the treaties, agreements, and bureaucratic setups governing them. The biggest concern has been the role of countries that  bought-in to the deforestation setup for the first time. While Brazil’s inclusion in the agreement has been touted as a game changing scenario for deforestation and harbinger of success of the agreement, critics have alleged that Brazil’s commitment resembles active attempts at greenwashing and is nothing more than a hollow pledge to gain access to climate finance. While Brazil has sent the second largest delegation to COP26, deforestation rates in Amazon in the past 12 months from June have reached their highest levels ever. So will Brazil show a turn around in the next decade? We can only speculate that there is a high chance of underperformance in Brazil due to its current regime’s anti-environmental actions leading right up to COP26 and its needs as an emerging economy. In such a situation, the role of transnational networks of epistemic and activist in the implementation of this agreement in Brazil is of paramount importance in holding it accountable.

Similarly, China has shown a colder attitude to climate change negotiations in COP26 in a clear departure from its earlier ambitions of global leadership in climate action. It has shown clear preference for pursuing environmentally unsustainable practices if the costs get too high with their announcement of 11 new coal plants in view of rising oil prices. Deforestation agreements can suffer a similar fate in China if costs of abatement of deforestation locally and globally get too high.

The US congress also has a history of refusing to ratify environmental treaties due to domestic political conflicts. If Democrats lose control of the Senate in 2022 midterm elections or there is a lack of broad support for these pledges, the USA’s commitment and support to this agreement and other such agreements at COP26 could become a problem.

Lastly, this agreement would not mean anything if the haves of this world continue consuming the same lifestyles that drove our Blue Marble to this state of sheer fragility and possible collapse at the expense of have-nots. The pledged to source out deforestation-driving products by corporations is a necessary step, but many of these companies still fall short of providing remuneration for the profit earned by dwindling forest cover of developing countries over the past decades. Just as fossil fuel companies knowingly brought us to the brink of climate crisis, corporations that drove deforestation have KNOWINGLY landed us in a world of shrinking and fragmenting forests and an extinction crisis by imperilling biodiversity. They should be held accountable. Moreover, we as consumers should feel compelled to source our material comforts locally and sustainably. There is evidence that consumers can change their lifestyles for the better and deforestation is one sector that can allow consumers to express their preferences and make an impact.

Finally, it is vital that we as members of civil society place pressure on governments and the private sector to follow through on their commitments. In the United States and other signatory countries, this looks like working to build political will for ratification, an extensive reforestation program, and meaningful support to indigenous communities, as well as tying agreement followthrough to their diplomatic agenda. Citizens have a vital role in ensuring that agreements made at COP are followed and expanded, and in shaping a more sustainable and just future.

Having scored tickets to the Paris Committee’s (see our earlier blog) December 8th meeting, we huddled into the large plenary room at 7pm.  Two of our three tickets came from the YOUNGO group and one of our tickets was from the RINGO group.  Both organizations are given a limited number of tickets for the plenary events, which they distribute to their constituency members.  Even though we could have watched the Committee’s deliberations through teleconferencing in nearby rooms, we felt excited to witness the whole of the vast room, filled with negotiators, academics, simultaneous translators, and students.

 

At 7.30pm (half an hour after the publicized time of the start of the meeting), dozens of people were still flowing into the room every minute, even though the discussions had already commenced.  Just then, one of the Party delegates from India asked to have the floor to remark that while empty seats remained for Party members, they were not being allowed in and being told the room was full. In response, the COP President, Minister Laurent Fabius, reassured the representative that he would have this mistake corrected immediately.  Whether or not it was the intervention from the President, by 7.45, there was barely any standing room left in the massive conference hall.

 

During the event, different facilitators of the Paris Committee reported back on their consultations, which almost always included bilateral negotiations as well as multilateral negotiations.  The facilitators lead each of the committee’s work streams in pairs, typically with one representative from a developing country and one from a developed country.  During their presentations, many facilitators applauded the common ground found in their negotiations and praised the increased inclusiveness and transparency of the proceedings.

It seemed from this briefing that the 1.5 Celsius language is becoming a real possibility.   Yet, the two sticking points — differentiation and loss & damage — continue to divide the Parties.  Many of the facilitators emphasized that their negotiations were going to continue that evening, particularly with regard to these two issues.  Following the facilitators’ reports, the floor was opened to all Parties. Speaking first, the South African representative expressed the necessity to allow ample time for all Parties and regional groupings to consider the draft of the agreement, which is expected today (Wednesday the 9th) at around 1pm.  Her intervention emphasized the position of G77+China that the Paris text should be “Party-owned”.  As representatives continued to take the floor, an impressive number of delegates referenced the G77+China.  These Parties expressed particular concern with Article 2 of the draft agreement, the section that most explicitly deals with human rights, differentiation, and equity.
As we were leaving the negotiating hall, Al Gore’s impassioned call from his speech earlier in the day rang in our ears — “Our best hope for addressing the climate crisis before it is too late is: Here Now.”

 

-Anita Desai, Stephen O’Hanlon, Ayse Kaya

Follow us throughout the week on Twitter (@SwarthmoreCOP21) and Snapchat (SwarthmoreCOP21) to get real-time updates.

Today was Gender Day at COP21, and given the importance of the day, we attended a fascinating panel on the issue of gender and climate change – Experiences from grassroots: Why we need Gender Responsive Climate Finance – in the Netherlands’ government pavilion.  This panel demonstrated the importance of side events that bring together both officials (be they from governments or multilateral institutions) and non-governmental organizations and grassroots movement leaders.  In this case, the panel included a dialogue between the NGO representatives from the Central American Women’s Fund, the Global Greengrants Fund, The Samdhana Institute, and AKSI! Indonesia, and a Board member from the Green Climate Fund, to which hopes are pinned for climate adaptation and green economy funds in the poor countries.

 

This was such a rich panel that it is difficult to do it justice in a blog post.  While the discussion presented hopeful prospects for the future of climate finance, some of the panelists and members of the audience were clearly discouraged by the immense amount of work left to do in this area.

 

On the upside, the Green Climate Fund (GCF), as the Board member stressed, is the first multilateral financing institution to incorporate gender into its mission and policies from the start.  As GCF documentation indicates:  “The Fund will strive to maximize the impact of its funding for adaptation and mitigation, and seek a balance between the two, while promoting environmental, social, economic and development co-benefits and taking a gender sensitive approach.”  The potential for the GCF to support all sorts of organizations working to improve the lives of women across the world is huge.

 

However, the GCF’s funding mechanism offers some challenges to non-governmental organizations.  To simplify a complex process, institutions must be accredited to receive funds from the GCF.  Non-accredited institutions can apply for funds, but need to work with accredited institutions.  Things get more complicated, however, because the GCF works through Nationally Designated Authorities (NDAs), which it calls the “interface” between the country and the Fund.  The NDAs are meant to align the distributed resources of the GCF with national objectives and priorities.  Even more, applications of accreditation to the GCF need to have evidence of nomination from the NDA for the country in which the project is to take place.  And, projects submitted for funding to the GCF need a “letter of no objection” from the country’s NDA for the country in which the project is to take place.  But, NDAs are political institutions that don’t necessarily have the same priorities around gender as the GCF.  These difficulties can easily pose an unwelcome barrier between the GCF’s funds and their ultimate intended recipients, vulnerable communities that need help.

 

Moreover, the GCF process poses significant capacity challenges for small grassroots organizations.  Panelists from these groups cited the large amount of time and resources needed to prepare documentation for and file applications, which must be completely in English, a significant barrier in many developing countries. These ‘costs to entry’ make the fund less friendly to small scale grassroots projects, which often are led by women. They suggested additional advising and support from the GCF could support small-scale projects.

 

The GCF appears dedicated to integrating gender as an integral dimension of its operations, but as always, the devil will be in the implementation.

-Anita Desai, Stephen O’Hanlon, Ayse Kaya

Follow us throughout the week on Twitter (@SwarthmoreCOP21) and Snapchat (SwarthmoreCOP21) to get real-time updates.