The National Designated Authority (NDA) Representative at the Ministry of Finance, Mr. Foster Gyamfi says to achieve the Ghana Nationally Determined Contributions (Gh NDCs), government will enhance its prioritization of climate actions and funding.
He entreated the youth to design business proposals to boost the existing green jobs they’ve created.
He called for the mobilization of financial resources which he says is key in ensuring that Ghana addresses many of the challenges associated with the implementation of adaptation and mitigation actions.
Mr Gyamfi said these at Strategic Youth Network’s (SYND) climate finance workshop in Accra which forms part of its effort to equip young people with knowledge on climate and its related issues.
The two-day workshop broadened the selected young participants’ knowledge on climate adaptation, mitigation, and climate financing.
Dubbed Climate Finance 101 under the theme “The role of young people in Climate financing” the program assisted participants to learn the basics of global and national Climate Finance, key issues and players in the sector, campaign ideas, and among others.
According to Maxwell Beganim, a member of the SYND Policy Team, the financial support is needed as mitigation efforts to decarbonize the economy and assist the country to achieve global temperature rise below 2 Degrees Celsius.
He observed that “adaptation and mitigation are complementary strategies for reducing and managing the risks of climate change”.
He cited China, India, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Turkey, and Mauritania as major countries that have contributed Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into climate financing in Ghana.
He added that funding for climate finance is organized roughly using the polluter pay principle from the environmental law.
“There are two ways of defining climate finance. One definition is that climate finance is the financial resources devoted to addressing climate change globally. The second definition is that climate finance is the financial flows to developing countries to assist them in addressing climate change”, he explained
Some accredited financial mechanisms and multilaterals that provide climate funds include Global Environment Fund (GEF), Climate Investment Fund (CIF), Green Climate Fund(GCF), which is the largest multilateral climate in addition to other specially created funds like; Special Climate Change Fund (SCCF), the Least Developed Countries Fund (LDCF) and the Adaptation Fund (AF).
The funds from these institutions “seek to provide the financial resources to developing countries, LDC and Small Islands to facilitate the provision of climate finance”.
A total of 403 Climate-related projects were committed to Ghana in a sum of $776.5 US million dollars from the period of 2013 to 2017.
In 2017, out of $277 million US dollars that were given to the country, only 104 projects were disclosed to have taken place.
This pushed the speakers to rhetorically question the availability of the projects and their benefits to the vulnerable in Ghana.
On the way forward to ensuring that funds received are judiciously used for the benefit of all, the Executive Coordinator of SYND Chibeze Ezekiel proposed the development of IE and C materials targeted at schools and communities in support of public education efforts.
Additionally, the tracking of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) in critical areas like forestry, transportation, energy, health, infrastructure planning, waste, and early warning systems and as well as holding government accountable to deliver on commitment on proposed unconditional actions must be keenly pursued by young people.
“Hashtag such as #FollowClimateFinanceProject, #WhereAreTheClimateProjects, can be used by young people to demand accountability from government”, Chibeze charged.
The 2020 Africa Goldman Environmental Activist prize winner also encouraged participants not to only find interests in criticizing government but also “amplify Ghana’s progress or success stories on climate change actions to attract investors.”
Solomon Yamoah the General Manager of Wisdom Ways academy and the Partnership and Netw member of SYND, says it was unproductive for civil society organizations and young people to attend climate change conferences and workshops but take no action afterward.
He urged the participants to change the narrative and take action in their respective capacities and communities using knowledge gained from the workshop towards achieving the climate change fight.
The workshop was graced by representatives from Ghana Education service, ActionAid Ghana, Embassy of Switzerland, and Kasa Initiative Ghana.