The UK is currently making headlines on the Internet relating Kate Middleton?s?pregnancy. But at COP18 in Doha, the UK is also being?favoured?as the first country to officially pledge?substantial?money for climate financing. Yesterday, UK?s Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Ed Davey announced UK?s pledge of ?1.8 billion to help poorer countries deal with climate change from 2012-2015. The announcement also include that 50% of the amount will be used for climate adaptation. While the news is certainly noteworthy and appreciable, it is important to inquire more closely if this pledge will be met through ?new? and ?additional? resources and is not just a ?MAFA? (Mistaken Articulation for Action).
Developed countries have committed to mobilize sufficient funding for developing countries adaptation and mitigation efforts under several international negotiations, the recent being the promise to mobilize $100 billion annually by 2020. Yet, past experience from Fast Start Finance and Adaptation Fund tells us that most of the funding that came into these instruments was redirected from the ODA (Official Development Assistance) share of the developed countries. Further, there lacks consistent and comprehensive data to track the commitments and climate finance by developed nations.
The negotiations under the subsidiary body of the UNFCCC (SBSTA) aimed to adopt common?tabular?formats for reporting and verification by developed countries on climate finance (MRV on finance). The idea, proposed by developing countries, is to list?individual, bilateral?financed?actions of each country in a detailed format rather than just?mentioning?aggregate figures. Clearly, this was blocked by the developed countries who see this process to be cumbersome. It is important to note that in the absence of such reporting system, it is easy for the developed countries to pledge money for climate?finance?by just changing numbers in their balance sheets than actually making concrete and real contributions.
So while we thank the UK government for being so generous in pledging money to climate finance, I think we will appreciate more if you and your friends (the developed countries) be more transparent in telling us from where and how your climate finance is flowing.
osu football osu football oklahoma state santonio holmes raheem morris winter classic mt rainier
No comments:
Post a Comment