GCF Approves New $1.2 Billion Climate Change Response Projects

The 29th Meeting of the Green Climate Fund Board

[Asia Economy Reporter Jang Sehee] The Green Climate Fund (GCF) has approved greenhouse gas reduction projects worth $1.2 billion for developing countries.

According to the Ministry of Economy and Finance on the 20th, the GCF held its 29th board meeting via video conference from the 16th to the 19th (Korean time) and newly approved a total of 15 greenhouse gas reduction and climate change adaptation projects worth $1.19 billion.

The GCF was established to support greenhouse gas reduction and climate change adaptation in developing countries. The establishment of the GCF was agreed upon at the 2010 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Conference of the Parties, and its secretariat was launched in 2013 in Songdo, Korea.

At this board meeting, the GCF newly approved 15 projects totaling $1.19 billion in GCF support, including ASEAN Green Finance Promotion Support ($300 million), Mongolia Western Green Region Development Program ($175 million), and India Green Growth Fund ($137 million), aimed at greenhouse gas reduction and climate change adaptation.

The Ministry of Economy and Finance explained that through this project approval, a total investment effect of $7.46 billion is expected across 30 developing countries.

With the new approvals, the total number of GCF projects has expanded to 173, with GCF support amounting to $8.4 billion and total project scale reaching $30.3 billion. It is estimated that approximately 500 million people in climate-vulnerable developing countries will benefit, and a total of 1.8 billion tons (t) of greenhouse gases will be reduced.

Additionally, the GCF board discussed measures to simplify overlapping procedures in the project development process and to introduce an exceptional streamlined approval process for innovative projects with significant related investment effects. This agenda will be further refined based on board members’ opinions and adopted at the next board meeting.

The board also discussed an integrated project performance management system to strengthen the GCF project evaluation framework by revising existing performance indicators and introducing qualitative indicators to measure the outcomes of green transition, thereby supporting the paradigm shift in climate change response in developing countries.

Meanwhile, the next GCF board meeting is scheduled to be held from June 28 to July 1.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.