Money allocated for the climate-vulnerable people hardly ends up reaching them due to the absence of capable institutions and proper distribution, speakers said at an event hosted by Brac at the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) Saturday.
Three big failures are seriously undermining the efforts to tackle the negative impacts of climate change, said Dr Professor Saleemul Huq, director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development in Dhaka, and one of the world’s foremost experts on the climate crisis.
The first failure is on the part of the developed countries in releasing the $100 billion they promised in 2009, to channel to vulnerable countries.
The second failure, according to Dr Huq, is that they are giving 20 percent of the money for adaptation and 50 percent for mitigation, when the ratio should be 50/50.
The third and final failure is that the funds reach only 2 percent of the vulnerable people.
Saleemul was addressing the panel discussion “Climate Bridge Fund: An innovative CSO-led financing to build the resilience of climate migrants in Bangladesh” held at the Bangladesh Pavilion at the COP26 in Glasgow, UK.
“We are yet to get the $100 billion a year promised to less wealthy nations by 2020 to help them adapt to climate change and mitigate further rises in temperature. The issue has not been resolved up to now. We want the developed countries to start disbursing these funds, and they should start right now,” said Md Mostafa Kamal, secretary at the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, while addressing the discussion as chief guest.
Brac, the world’s largest NGO that fights poverty across the global South from its Bangladeshi base, established the Climate Bridge Fund (CBF) as a trust fund in November 2019, with the support of the German government through KfW, the country’s state-owned investment and development bank.
The aim of the fund is to support adaptation and risk-reduction measures of people who are displaced or at the risk of being displaced due to the impacts of climate change in Bangladesh.
Legally it operates as an endowment fund. CBF invested about €10 million (Euros) in treasury bonds. Proceeds are being used to support local organisations to implement adaptation projects.
Barbara Schnell, director of KfW, said: “Bangladesh’s climate migrants have a very uncertain future. We think the CBF initiatives have four success factors, including capacity building. It has bridged the gaps for vulnerable people.”
Asif Saleh, executive director of Brac, said: “The CBF model of Brac-KfW can be a unique model to address problems of climate migrants and vulnerable people in the urban areas.”
“We do not have any master plan to address the climate change issue in the cities. CBF wants to promote locally-led adaptation to avoid climatic risks not only in Bangladesh, but also the other countries in the world.”
Source: United News of Bangladeshy