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Finance for Climate

The Regional Collaboration Centers (RCC) offer a wide scope of services, which include:

  • CDM - Supporting stakeholders to the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) with a focus on underrepresented countries;
  • NDC - Supporting the interface between the intergovernmental process in facilitating the implementation of the Paris Agreement and Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs);
  • UN - Support collaboration with other partners and programs within and outside the UN system;
  • GCA - Supporting the Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Action including promotion, communication, recognition and provision of operations and administration services;
  • Finance for Climate (F4C) - Support the facilitation of finance for climate investments in accordance with nationally determined and sustainable development priorities, including project finance (CDM activities).

The Finance for Climate (F4C) stream of service, aims to substantially scale up finance and investment. It does this by inter alia:

  1. Providing technical advice (identifying opportunities and connecting the right stakeholders with these opportunities);

  2. Convening / coordinating with actors to develop/strengthen synergies in their efforts, and avoid duplication while building capacity to finance more and for longer;

  3. Recognizing/showcasing initiatives/ commitments that promote sustainable finance for climate.

Examples of this having been done through or with partners include:

  • Working with governments to actively promote low carbon and climate resilient investments, including CDM projects in their countries and disseminating information on their enabling investment environments to investors and other market players;

  • Working with project financiers to find markets, identify co-financiers to form consortia, access project development funding to support investment-mature projects, provide access to risk mitigation instruments and help structure projects and financing along the Paris Agreement;

  • Working with project developers to provide increased visibility of projects, making it easier to identify relevant financiers, advisors and service providers for specific needs and enable targeted and relevant engagements;

  • Working with financial institutions, bilateral funds, regional and multilateral development banks on mobilizing private capital, assisting on guarantees platforms, and supporting infrastructure investment.

UNFCCC RCC current hosting partners include:(Banque Ouest Africaine de Développement (BOAD), Corporacion Andina de Fomento (CAF), East African Development Bank (EADB), Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES), Windward Islands Research & Education Foundation (WINDREF)-

Activities include:

  1. Supporting the development of green bonds that provide proceeds for projects

  2. Facilitation of project finance via crowd-investment and funding

  3. Facilitation of green banks, including national and regional development finance institutions

  4. Facilitation of green loans and bonds to provide finance for projects in south-east Asia

Recent Developments:

Green Investment Catalyst (GIC)

The Green Investment Catalyst (GIC) process aims to facilitate needs based private sector finance. It operates in three phases: 

  1. Design and preparation of funding/investment vehicles or programmes that are aligned to countries’ NDCs and have tangible and measurable impact;
  2. Test concepts and generate private sector interest in these funding vehicles or programmes through roundtable discussions; and
  3. Launch concept with relevant private sector partners to increase investment in low-carbon, climate-resilient development.

Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Green Investment Catalyst Roundtable

The first GIC took place in June 2017 at the African Development Bank in Abidjan resulting in an ECOWAS Finance for Climate Platform, and a green bond program for the West African Development Bank, (BOAD), including a fund and guarantee facility. This new platform was launched at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP23) in 2017. The main objective of the platform is to finance renewable energy and energy efficiency initiatives by acting as an investment catalyst. Following this, the platform will expand to include emission reduction measures across multiple economic sectors, as well as initiatives that strengthen resilience against climate change impacts such as droughts or floods. Such action is critical as much of West Africa is already experiencing climate change impacts such as increased temperatures and changed rainfall patterns.

For further details on this event see the link.

Green Investment Catalyst and Finance Conference - June 2018

The Asia-Pacific Green Investment Catalyst and Green Finance Conference was convened on 5th and 6th June, 2018 in Singapore. The conference was attended by over 200 private sector and public debt capital market representatives including specific financial sector partners. This event was coordinated by the U.N Climate Change Regional Collaboration Centre in Bangkok and the partner institute for Global Environment Strategies (IGES), in partnership with the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), Global Financial Markets Association (GFMA) and the Asia Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association (ASIFMA). The objective of the conference was to explore the extent to which Asian capital markets could be leveraged to support sustainable and climate aligned economic growth within the region and launch several facilities and initiatives. Specific initiatives to enhance tangible private sector investments as well as projects under Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and promote investments towards low emission climate resilient strategies include:

  • The Sustainability Bond Facility for Micro-Finance institutions – A bond facility for financing lending to micro-finance institutions in the region;

  • Syndicated Regional Green Landing Facility – A loan facility to provide mid-scale syndicated concessional loans to enterprises in the region;

  • Green lending facility for the Asia Pacific – A lending facility aimed at smaller enterprises in the Asia-Pacific.

More information about this event can be found at: http://www.unescap.org/news/green-investment-catalyst-and-finance-conference-2018


Green Finance Conference, 5th to 6th June, 2018 – Singapore


Green Finance Conference, 5th to 6th June, 2018 – Singapore

Zimbabwe Green Investment Catalyst Roundtable - December, 2017

A Green Investment Catalyst Roundtable was held in December 2017. Zimbabwe’s NDC prescribes a 33 percent energy sector per capita greenhouse gas emission reduction target. The NDC is conditional on the means of implementation – specifically technology development, transfer, relevant training and financial support. The Infrastructural Development Bank of Zimbabwe is expanding its investment towards climate change projects, having recently received an equity capital boost of $150 million from its shareholders. The Bank has developed a Climate Finance Facility (modelled on the DBSA CFF) aimed at providing climate friendly projects with access to capital. The CFF would therefore bridge an important funding gap; by also promoting blended finance by targeting different stakeholders such as the Government, Development Finance Institutions and the Green Climate Fund.

More information is available at: https://www.herald.co.zw/idbz-targets-climate-change-projects/

     

The RCC Bangkok launched Sustainable Finance Bangkok – May, 2018

Sustainable Finance Bangkok is a newly developed community of Bangkok based finance/ capital market practitioners interested in participating in the transition towards sustainability and green investment in the region. The inaugural event was attended by more than 40 leading financial sector actors from Bangkok. The RCC Bangkok seeks to strengthen its relationship with key actors in the Thai financial sector to facilitate its work in the Finance for Climate process within this region – specifically through the Green Investment Catalyst process; working towards mobilizing the scale of finance required to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement.

The Sustainable Finance community aims to gather quarterly and discuss relevant green/sustainable finance issues and become an influencing working group towards mobilizing green finance in the region.

For further information about this event or if for further details about the platform, please contact: RCCBangkok@unfccc.int

Capacity building workshop on development of Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) activities and Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMA) for public and private sector in Zimbabwe – August, 2016, Nyanga Zimbabwe

The Climate Management Department of the Ministry of Environment, Water and Climate (The Ministry) in collaboration with the Regional Collaboration Centre (RCC) Kampala and supported with in kind financial support from UNDP, Zimbabwe and UNV, hosted a capacity building workshop on development of CDM, activities and NAMAs for public and private sector in Nyanga. The workshop was designed to create a facilitative dialogue among the diverse stakeholders in Zimbabwe on the opportunities presented by the CDM and NAMAs – specifically focusing on how the pre2020 action reaches into the broader mitigation action and contributes to the implementation of Zimbabwe’s (I)NDC, the means for capacity building and leverages finance for these actions. The workshop was attended by over 60 participants, including representatives from various government authorities, power and network regulators, transportation operators, private sector stakeholders, project proponents, development banks and environment and energy consultants.

More information about this event can be found here: https://unfccc.int/event/capacity-building-workshop-development-cdm-activities-and-nama-public-and-private-sector

 

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