Ramping up climate change finance and technology transfer

The new Advisory Group on Climate Change Financing has been set up to mobilise the financing promised for climate change by developed countries during the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December 2009. More specifically, developed countries agreed to provide USD 30 billion new and additional resources for the period 2010 to 2012 and committed to a goal of mobilising jointly USD 100 billion dollars a year by 2020 to address the needs of developing countries.

“Finance for adaptation and mitigation and transfer of technology are of central significance for developing countries in general and the poor and vulnerable countries in particular”, said Prime Minister of Ethiopia and co-chair of the group Meles Zenawi. It is hoped that the work of this new group will facilitate reaching an ambitious climate change agreement between developed and developing nations at the next Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Mexico in December 2010.

The group’s undertaking

“We must examine new sources of finance, both public and private. This is the task of the advisory group”, said Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Gordon Brown and co-chair of the new group at the press conference announcing the establishment of the group.

The Group will produce a final report containing recommendations before the next Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Mexico this December. It will develop practical proposals on how to:

• Scale-up long-term financing for mitigation and adaptation strategies in developing countries from various public as well as private sources.

• Fill the gap in international climate financing through identifying new and innovative long-term sources of finance

Structure of the advisory group

Co-chaired by Prime Minister Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia and Prime Minister Gordon Brown, United Kingdom, the new Group will include Heads of States and Government, high-level officials from ministries and central banks, as well as experts on public finance, development and related issues.

“We will be assembling the best experts from every part of the world to address one of the world’s greatest causes preventing catastrophic climate change”, said Gordon Brown at the press conference announcing the establishment of the group. The group, whose full list of members remains to be announced, will encompass a balance in representation between developing and developed countries.