Climate Finance Policies: Should We Reform or Not?

On 24 April, during the celebratory holiday period of Eid ul-Fitr in Pakistan, the IEU visited the Embassy of the Pakistan to the Korea to discuss climate action as part of the Unit’s Interns Day programme for the month of April.

The visit included a climate-focused discussion between Ambassador Nabeel Munir, Deputy Head of Mission, Dr. Ali Waqas Malik, and the IEU team. During the meeting, the officials expressed their gratitude for the GCF, which is supporting FP018: Scaling-up fo Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) risk reduction in Northern Pakistan, often referred to as the Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) Project. The project aims to build several weather stations, early warning systems, and hundreds of engineering infrastructures in order to reduce or prevent the dangers and effects of GLOF incidents.

As the discussion progressed, there was a swift shift in focus from climate projects to climate finance policies. In particular, the group discussed how the public sector and public funding could catalyze global action against climate change. Different financing issues were also raised during the meeting as they are seen to have the potential to help uncover new strategic and innovative solutions to tackle the climate crisis.

Private investments are highly capable of supporting the development of both current and future climate-related disaster initiatives, especially in addressing the climate risks of nations where local institutional investors are insufficient, like Pakistan.  But the sad truth is, there are many emerging and heavily indebted nations who are also particularly vulnerable to the consequences of climate change. At the same time, these countries may find it impractical to take on additional high-interest debt from private investors, particularly when they are not the primary contributors to the world’s stock of carbon emissions. This begs the question, “Should we reform the existing climate finance policies or not?”

This may be a complicated subject which calls for a more in-depth discussion and debate to fully realize the potential and for us to contemplate whether the existing climate finance policies need to be adjusted especially for nations who are highly affected by climate change. But as Ambassador Munir shared, “All countries should have the mindset that we are all living in the same planet.” Indeed, we are all living on the same planet and it is our responsibility to engage in widespread climate action to make this Earth more liveable. However, we can be on the same planet but on different worlds. Countries’ financial capacities largely differ and maybe, just maybe, it is time for us to rethink about the existing climate-related policies.

The IEU was represented during this visit by the Head of the IEU, Andreas Reumann and IEU interns Josephine Ngala, Imee Necesito, and Martina de Vries. The IEU delegation for this visit also included Chief Evaluation Advisor, Archi Rastogi and Communications and Uptake Associate, Jennifer Pampolina.

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Disclaimer: The views expressed in this blog are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Independent Evaluation Unit of the Green Climate Fund.