Climate financing needs exceed trust fund allocation: Mintoo

Bangladesh’s need for financing to protect land and build climate resilience has already exceeded the annual allocation of its Climate Change Trust Fund, Environment, Forest and Climate Change Minister Abdul Awal Mintoo said yesterday.

He made the remarks at a ministerial dialogue titled “Innovative Financial Mechanisms for Healthy Land and Drought Resilience” on Finance Day of the 17th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD COP17) in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

Tap here to add The Daily Star as a trusted source

Bangladesh is among the countries most vulnerable to climate change and is taking steps to tackle land degradation, Mintoo said.

National planning is increasingly focusing on soil fertility, forest coverage, waterlogging, hillside erosion, coastal salinity and riverbank erosion, he said.

“Land must be treated as an economic and development priority,” he added.

Highlighting the country’s climate financing efforts, Mintoo said the Climate Change Trust Fund has supported climate and land resilience projects since 2009. One of the earliest funds of its kind in a developing country, it has mobilised more than $495 million so far.

The fund has helped develop 12 stress-tolerant crop varieties and distribute more than 19,400 tonnes of drought- and salt-tolerant seeds to farmers. But demand for funding has now outpaced the fund’s annual allocation, he said.

More financing is also needed for smallholder farmers and land restoration. Mintoo called on multilateral development banks and development finance institutions to make greater use of guarantees, first-loss capital and blended finance to meet the growing demand.

He proposed innovative financing tools such as debt-for-nature and debt-for-climate swaps and green bonds to support land restoration.

Such financing could help recharge groundwater in the northern region and support agriculture, afforestation, climate-smart farming and coastal mangrove restoration under the National Green Mission, he said.

Mintoo also urged countries sharing river basins to strengthen cross-border water-sharing arrangements and exchange information on water shortages and land degradation.

“Bangladesh stands ready both to give and receive cooperation,” he said. “We seek specific, adequately funded and time-bound commitments so that land finance moves from the margins to the centre of decision-making.”