Multilateral climate finance coordination

The governance of public climate finance for mitigation and adaptation in developing countries is highly fragmented, with many different actors and overlapping mandates and preferences. This has raised concerns that the already sparse climate funds may be ineffectively used and could end up supporting contradictory activities.

Coordination among the global climate funds is therefore needed, yet so far it has proven difficult. This article uncovers some of the reasons by examining the coordination efforts of the two most important multilateral climate funds, the Climate Investment Funds (CIF) and the Green Climate Fund (GCF). The article examines coordination at the global level and in two recipient countries, Kenya and Zambia. 

The CIF and the GCF are anchored within the World Bank and the United Nations framework respectively, and represent two diverging perspectives on climate finance. While the CIFs approach climate finance as integral to development activities, it is treated as a distinct domain in the Green Climate Funds. Yet these differences are depoliticized by treating coordination as a technical exercise, rendering invisible the political divergences.  Both funds furthermore end up coordinating mainly with actors with similar preferences. As a result, actual coordination between the funds is inefficient and does not achieve its objectives.

The research is part of the collaborative “Share or Spare” project led by Lund University and funded by the Swedish Research Council. Other publications include:

The politics of climate finance coordination (Policy Brief)
Climate finance coordination from the global to the local (Open Access Journal Article)
Country ownership in climate finance coordination (Open Access Journal Article)