Financing tops agenda at Africa Climate Summit :: Mmegi Online

The issue of funding the continent’s energy transition once again took centre stage at last week’s inaugural Africa Climate Summit. Africans once again demanded that the developed world, which is most responsible for polluting the planet, bear the bulk of the cost of cleaning it up.

Fourteen years ago, rich countries made a significant pledge to channel $100 billion a year to developing nations by 2020 to help them adapt to climate change and mitigate the situation. None of this finance has come.

Fast forward from Copenhagen, Denmark in 2009 to Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt last year where the historic Loss and Damage Fund was agreed upon last year, and this financing mechanism is yet to be operationalised. Developing countries that have been able to negotiate funding from the rich nations have found the terms to be restrictive, either in terms of rates, the nature of funding, or the interventions for which the funds can be allocated.

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