COP27: Developing countries will need $2tn a year in climate funding by 2030
"Developing countries ‘will need $2tn a year in climate funding by 2030’", 8 November 2022
About $2tn (£1.75tn) will be needed each year by 2030 to help developing countries cut their greenhouse gas emissions and cope with the effects of climate breakdown, new data suggests.
The cash will be needed so that poor countries can switch away from fossil fuels, invest in renewable energy and other low-carbon technology, and cope with the impacts of extreme weather, according to a report that was commissioned jointly by the UK and Egyptian governments, and presented at the Cop27 UN climate summit...
“Around half of the required financing can be reasonably expected to come from local sources, from strengthening domestic public finance and domestic capital markets, including tapping into large pools of local finance that national development banks are able to mobilise,” the report says. However, external finance, as well as the World Bank and other multilateral development banks, must also play a key role...
The money is also needed to help poor countries adapt to the effects of the climate crisis, for instance by building more robust infrastructure, and protections such as seawalls and early warning systems. For the most severe impacts of climate breakdown, which countries cannot adapt to, known as loss and damage, the money would help to rescue those at risk, repair vital infrastructure and help to heal the social fabric – services such as health and education – of countries torn apart by extreme weather, such as devastating floods, droughts, storms and heatwaves, that is likely to worsen as a result of climate breakdown...
Poor countries have been promised since 2009 that by 2020 they would receive at least $100bn a year to help them cut emissions and cope with the impacts of extreme weather. But that target has repeatedly been missed, and is not likely to be fulfilled until next year...
The World Bank has come under increasing criticism in recent months for its perceived failures to direct sufficient funds towards the climate crisis...