Setting the scene
During the COP29, a new climate finance commitment was set to counter climate change. However, this agreement triggered a wave of negative reactions as many actors were left deeply unsatisfied with the allocated budget for climate finance. During our session, Barbara Rosen Jacobson of Mercy Corps shared these feelings, as she highlighted some challenges with the current system, for example its loan-based structure and its unbalanced budget division in regard to mitigation and adaptation. Nonetheless, she did point out important initiatives that were presented at the COP, like the launch of the Common Principles for Conflict Sensitive Climate Action. These principles seek to improve the access to climate finance in conflict-ridden areas.
Climate finance accountability
Besides the international mobilization of climate finance, it is important to know what happens with the allocated money once it arrives in a country. Consequently, Oxfam’s fiscal justice partners conducted climate finance accountability studies in Vietnam, Nigeria and Uganda. Based on the findings of these studies, Judith van Neck of Oxfam Novib called attention to the lack of transparency within climate finance streams, as climate finance is generally integrated into wider budgets. Because of this, she recommended the use of budget tagging tools, like a climate code, to get more insight into what is being done with the money. Moreover, she emphasized the need for further integration of gender equality in gender action plans. This includes the participation of women and girls in decision-making processes and the creation of climate & gender-responsive budgets. In addition to this, van Neck advocated for an increased capacity of local governments. At the same time, we should make sure that there are spaces for citizens and civil society to provide local governments with feedback and ensure transparent and equitable spending. One tool in this can be the freedom of information acts which can force governments to publish acts and papers. Other ways to push for accountability include translating key documents, writing budget documents in simpler language and training civil society’s budget literacy.
Decentralized finance for climate justice
It is important to point out that current financing systems are not designed to support small, informal and grassroot groups and organizations efficiently. During the session, Diana Francês of WWF mentioned how the majority of traditional funds tend to deepen inequalities as they often do not reach vulnerable communities in the Global South. For this reason, the Voices for Just Climate Action Alliance set up the Next Level Grant Facility, which is a small grants mechanism that is designed to ensure that finance reaches the most local levels. During the session, Francês outlined the workings of the grant mechanism as well as the challenges, such as scoping, selection criteria and measuring the impact of the grants. The lessons learned from this grant mechanism can also be used to advocate for access to climate finance for local communities and to unpack systemic barriers to access climate finance.
Where to go from here?
In an engaging discussion, we further explored the role of civil society in ensuring just, transparent and equitable climate finance on a national level. Moreover, we looked at the role that we, as international NGOs, can play to strengthen civil society to work towards just climate finance.
The key take-aways of the conversation include:
- There is a pressing need for clear definitions and transparency in the climate finance system.
- We should make more effort to involve younger generations in the climate movement and to include young people outside of Europe.
- The Global South perspective is currently missing in the bigger climate debates. Local communities lack participation, and those who usually represent the Global South tend to come from wealthy backgrounds. We should hold the Global North more accountable for its actions regarding pollution and excess emissions.
- Collaboration is very important within the climate justice movement: we should aim to break through the different organisational silos that we work in.
Importantly, we asked the participants to come up with one concrete action that we can take based on the conversations. You can find the recommendations here:
- Create local (financial) circuits to make sure the money stays.
- Include young (international) professionals!
- Hold the Global North and private sector accountable.
- Create a dashboard or overview: What climate finance is there, which sources?
- Bring Global South voices to the negotiation table.
- Work in alliances.
- Transcend Global South / Global North boundaries. For instance by using online meetings and creating global networks.