At Cancun, the COP decided to establish a Standing Committee to assist it in exercising its functions with respect to the Financial Mechanism of the Convention. But it left open how exactly this should be done. The ecbi Policy Brief by Farrukh Khan and Benito M¸ller begins by looking at the COP functions which the Standing Committee is meant to assist considering, in particular, how such assistance could enhance the implementation of the Financial Mechanism. Based on this analysis, the brief puts forward detailed recommendations concerning the functions and the form of the Standing Committee.

At the 2009 Copenhagen climate change negotiations the worldís wealthier nations pledged major funding to help developing countries shift to a lower-carbon economy, and to deal with current and future climate change impacts. They pledged US$30 billion of ënew and additionalí fast-start climate finance, with funding ëbalancedí between mitigation and adaptation. We are now at the end of the fast-start period (2010-2012). So which contributor countries met their obligations and which are lagging?