The most detailed analysis to date of how well rich nations have kept promises to provide the poorer ones with funds to tackle climate change released Nov 26 concludes that they have collectively failed to fulfil eight substantive pledges.
Published by the London-based International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) — the study comes as countries prepare for the latest round of intergovernmental climate-change negotiations, which begin in early December in Doha, Qatar.
The wealthier nations promised in 2009 to provide developing countries with US$30 billion by the end of 2012, and said this should be “new and additional” finance balanced between support for adaptation and mitigation activities.
In addition they made pledges about transparency, governance and the need to help the most vulnerable nations first.
But so far, only US$23.6 billion of the US$30 billion promised has been committed. And only 20 per cent of the fast start finance has been allocated to projects that will help poor nations adapt to a changing climate.
Less than half of the fast start finance is in the form of grants. The rest is loans, which means poor countries must repay with interest the costs of adapting to a problem they have not caused.
And rich nations have not provided enough transparent information to prove that their contributions are really new and not just diverted from existing aid budgets.
To examine transparency in more detail, the researchers evaluated donor nations across 24 measures. On the resulting scorecard, no donor nation scored more than 67 per cent.
“Without transparency about how and when rich countries will meet their climate finance pledges, developing countries are left unable to plan to adequately address and respond to climate change,” said co-author Timmons Roberts of Brown University in the United States, whose Climate and Development Lab led the research.
On these measures, Norway has performed best, providing five times its fair share. At the other end of the scale, both Iceland and the United States contributed less than half their fair share.
The broken promises will make it harder for developing countries to take seriously what richer nations say at the UN climate change talks, which take place in Doha from 26 November to 7 December.
However, the researchers say one way to restore trust would be for rich countries to channel their climate finance through funds that the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) set up as they have a governance structure with equal representation from developed and developing nations.
Also critical will be to fulfil the US$30 billion promise by the end of the calendar year, and to ensure that this money is delivered to support projects in a timely manner.
This is something that, in 2010, all rich countries agreed should be a feature of funds through which they channel their climate finance. Yet, so far, rich nations have channelled only two per cent of the climate finance through these UNFCCC funds.
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