As calls grow louder for wealthy countries to pony up more money for climate finance, a look under the hood of existing funds reveals a disturbing trend: The most vulnerable countries are also the least likely to get the financing they need to protect themselves from worsening droughts and floods.
A big piece of the blame lies with donors, who have created a labyrinth of disparate climate financing mechanisms that are hard for low-income nations to access. That’s according to new research from the Center for Global Development, which we are reporting on here first.
Just 5.37% of the $50 billion that donors have put into climate funds administered by the World Bank have gone to the 10 most climate-vulnerable nations, including Niger and Chad. Overall, only 13.1% of the climate funds’ cash goes to low-income countries.
About the authors
Shabtai Gold
Shabtai Gold is a Senior Reporter based in Washington. He covers multilateral development banks, with a focus on the World Bank, along with trends in development finance. Prior to Devex, he worked for the German Press Agency, dpa, for more than a decade, with stints in Africa, Europe, and the Middle East, before relocating to Washington to cover politics and business.
Adva Saldinger@AdvaSal
Adva Saldinger is a Senior Reporter at Devex where she covers development finance, as well as U.S. foreign aid policy. Adva explores the role the private sector and private capital play in development and authors the weekly Devex Invested newsletter bringing the latest news on the role of business and finance in addressing global challenges. A journalist with more than 10 years of experience, she has worked at several newspapers in the U.S. and lived in both Ghana and South Africa.
