On the Climate Finance Day of Action, ECO calls on the developed countries and Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) to honour their climate finance pledges up to 2020 and beyond. They should look at the climate finance pledges for 2020 they made themselves as the absolute minimum baseline level for support to reach the Paris climate goals and to enhance resilience of communities.
ECO is extremely disappointed to learn from this year’s Climate Finance Landscape Report that national climate finance went down. Plus, there are still several countries that haven’t even made a 2020 finance pledge (ECO is looking at you: Norway, Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden…)
In other bad news, MDBs’ fossil fuel finance went up from 2015 to 2016 – contrary to the urgent need for the Big Shift in investment from fossils to renewables. Given low levels of finance for renewable energy access, there is now more than ever an urgent need to phase out fossil fuel support. These funds must instead serve to boost renewable-based energy access.
Additionally, upon reaching the US$100 billion goal, the negotiations on accounting will be key to ensure that finance pledges are scaled up without dodgy accounting. Parties must not be allowed to double count for their pledges with other donors, but instead must agree on a more accurate method of counting adaptation finance. There is no climate justice without additional climate finance!
