Failure or final wake-up call for our leaders?
European Capacity Building Initiative
Policy Briefs and Notes
The report by Benito Müller looks at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen and evaluates what happened and suggests what lessons ought to be learned.
It has been said that summits are either 'successful' or 'very successful'. The time has come to face the facts: this is wrong! That is not to say that Copenhagen was a failure, but merely that it could have done better, but still probably passed the test. The final verdict will depend on what happens next. The report by Benito M¸ller looks at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen and evaluates what happened and suggests what lessons ought to be learned.
Publication Date:
February, 2010
This Rough Guide to Enhanced Direct Access (EDA) by Benito Müller provides the key conceptual tools needed to understand EDA and exemplifies the main access models graphically with a number of figures, meant to illustrate the key differences between these models.
This Rough Guide to Enhanced Direct Access (EDA) by Benito Müller provides the key conceptual tools needed to understand EDA and exemplifies the main access models graphically with a number of figures, meant to illustrate the key differences between these models.
Publication Date:
March, 2014
This OCP/ecbi submission to the Standing Committee on Finance summarizes the most recent developments regarding the relations between the Adaptation Fund and the Green Climate Fund and proposes that with regard to this particular relationship, the SCF should focus on how to make best use of existing complementarities between the two funds.
Publication Date:
April, 2015
A policy brief proposing a Reformed Financial Mechanism for the post Copenhagen period.
A policy brief proposing a Reformed Financial Mechanism for the post Copenhagen period.
Post Copenhagen Architecture and Governance
Publication Date:
April, 2010
The Green Climate Fund (GCF) Board is in the process of considering "additional modalities that further enhance direct access". A devolved and decentralized access modality has been proposed as an alternative to the more traditional model, where detailed project approval is carried out at the multilateral level. This ecbi Policy Brief by Benito Müller and William Pizer explains the relation between "enhanced direct access" and "programmatic approaches," and addresses certain concerns raised about this decentralized/devolved access model, using seven case studies to illustrate current practices that could provide ideas and insights about how the GCF might design its own approach. The case studies are focused around four questions:
a. How does the funding model generally work, in terms of disbursing funds?
b. Who decides what? What decisions are taken by the governing funding body and what decisions are devolved and to whom?
c. How does this funding model ensure the governing body’s objectives are met, and how does it ensure that the various fiduciary standards and safeguards are satisfied?
d. How is the funding level for a particular programme determined?
The Green Climate Fund (GCF) Board is in the process of considering "additional modalities that further enhance direct access". A devolved and decentralized access modality has been proposed as an alternative to the more traditional model, where detailed project approval is carried out at the multilateral level. This ecbi Policy Brief by Benito Müller and William Pizer explains the relation between "enhanced direct access" and "programmatic approaches," and addresses certain concerns raised about this decentralized/devolved access model, using seven case studies to illustrate current practices that could provide ideas and insights about how the GCF might design its own approach. The case studies are focused around four questions:
a. How does the funding model generally work, in terms of disbursing funds?
b. Who decides what? What decisions are taken by the governing funding body and what decisions are devolved and to whom?
c. How does this funding model ensure the governing body’s objectives are met, and how does it ensure that the various fiduciary standards and safeguards are satisfied?
d. How is the funding level for a particular programme determined?
Publication Date:
March, 2014
Having been established more than a decade ago to address the urgent and immediate needs of the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) especially vulnerable to the impact of climate change, the Least Developed Countries Fund for Climate Change (LDCF) still struggles to obtain adequate and predictable funding. The Global Environment Facility, the operating entity of the LDCF, has been unable to program LDCF resources at the level of around US$200 million per year, as proposed in the Programming Strategy for the LDCF.
More generally, this Think Piece by Benito Müller argues, a success at the UN Climate change summit Paris in December will require a significant finance package which is not ad hoc, but rather provides genuine longer-term predictability. In addition to using the proceeds of new international market mechanisms, we think there is also a need to look at innovative sources at the national and sub-national level.
Publication Date:
May, 2015
The Adaptation Fund After Marrakech. OCP/ecbi Discussion Note
Publication Date:
January, 2017
The 'institutionalized' group of Friends of the Chair is composed of delegates trying to influence the Chairman and each other about the way forward, reflecting national positions, and trying to hammer out compromises.
In the preparations for the Copenhagen COP-15 and in the aftermath of the confusing negotiations in Bella Centre there have been many references to the concept of Friends of the Chair. The 'institutionalized' group of Friends of the Chair is composed of delegates trying to influence the Chairman and each other about the way forward, reflecting national positions, and trying to hammer out compromises. This is a long-haul effort which is different from the idea of appointing Friends of the Chair as part of the end game of a negotiation: in this latter case it is ideally a method for the Chairman to get the most important actors to agree and clinch a deal that will lead to final agreement in the plenary.
The Art of Negotiation in the Rio process and climate negotiations
Publication Date:
April, 2010
Generating new (innovative) sources of funding from US states, regions, and cities, for the Least Developed Countries Fund (LDCF) of the Financial Mechanism of the UNFCCC/Paris Agreement.
Publication Date:
June, 2017
