FE DESK

Multilateral development banks (MDBs) have announced that their global climate finance hit a record high of $125 billion in 2023.

This combined amount from the MDBs, including the Asian Development Bank (ADB), is more than double the amount provided in 2019, when MDBs agreed new targets at the United Nations Secretary General’s Climate Action Summit, said an ADB press release on Saturday.

The announcement of the findings of the Joint Report on Multilateral Development Banks’ Climate Finance came on Friday ahead of the 29th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 29) that will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan in November 2024.

Of the $125 billion, MDBs allocated $74.7 billion to low- and middle-income economies. Of this sum, 67 per cent or $50 billion went to climate change mitigation, which refers to actions that reduce, avoid, limit or sequester greenhouse gas emissions, and $24.7 billion or 33 per cent for climate change adaptation.

Adaptation finance involves activities and measures aiming at reducing the risks or vulnerabilities posed by climate change, and at increasing climate resilience.

The amount of mobilised private finance for this group of countries stood at $28.5 billion.

“We welcome the fact that MDBs provided record climate finance last year, every dollar of which makes a difference in helping to cut carbon emissions or preparing people and infrastructure for the worst impacts of climate change, much of which we must recognize is already baked in,” said Bruno Carrasco, director general (DG) for Sustainable Development and Climate Change of ADB.

“There remains a large financing gap and the ADB will continue to work closely with other MDBs — and in its own right — to get as much financing as possible to our developing member countries,” he added.

The joint report, along with the banks’ independent publication of their own individual climate finance statistics, is intended to track progress in relation to their joint climate finance commitments-such as those announced at COP21 and the greater ambition pledged for the post-2020 period.

The 2023 multilateral development bank report, coordinated by the European Investment Bank (EIB), combines data from the African Development Bank (AfDB), the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), the Council of Europe Development Bank (CEB), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the EIB, the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), the New Development Bank (NDB) and the World Bank Group (WBG).