Mr Kenneth Ofori-Atta, the Minister of Finance, says one of Ghana’s priority actions as she assumes the presidency of Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF) is to strengthen cooperation between CVF and development partners to deliver funding for adaptation activities.
The CVF is a global partnership of developing nations that are disproportionately affected by the consequences of global warming, and are tackling climate change to survive and thrive.
He stated that as CVF President, the country would set up a financial mechanism for Loss and Damage associated with climate change impacts, including flood, long drought spell and erratic rainfall.
The Minister explained that such financing mechanism would provide meaningful avenues to deal with climate risk and help turn member states vulnerability to resilience and prosperity.
Mr Ofori-Atta made this known at an outreach workshop in Accra to lay the foundation for Ghana’s Presidency as CVF beginning May 2022 to May 2024.
At the just ended COP26, the members of the CVF agreed for Ghana to take over from Bangladesh as the next Presidency of the Forum as adopted in the CVF Dhaka-Glasgow Declaration.
As part of preparatory activities, a delegation from the CVF Secretariat and the outgoing Presidency of Bangladesh are in Ghana to help ensure a smooth leadership transition.
Mr Ofori-Atta stated that the country recognized that, the current architecture did not cater for the needs of the climate-vulnerable economies and would take steps to address the challenge.
“Building on the success of the Presidency of Bangladesh that has developed the first of the many Climate Prosperity Plans, we look forward to developing ours and more importantly, to spur and mobilize international investment through market creation and increased participation, technology transfer and economic partnerships, for accelerated action,” he said
Ghana, he said, was committed to increase the number of members over the next two years as well as work towards expanding the portfolio of the CVF.
Dr Kwaku Afriyie, the Minister of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, in a statement delivered on his behalf, said climate change had posed additional stress to economies of CVF member states hampering their quest to attaining development.
He said the recent intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report confirmed that Sub-Saharan Africa was one of the most vulnerable to the impacts of global warming.
The report said the region received inadequate adaptation and resilience-enabling financing from the Global North, which was responsible for 92 per cent of the excess carbon emissions responsible for climate change.
“According to the State of the Climate in Africa 2020 report, investment in climate adaptation for sub-Saharan Africa would cost between US$30 billion to US$50 billion each year over the next decade, or roughly two to three per cent of GDP,” he quoted.
Mr Mathew McKinnon, the Head of Programme at CVF, said the forum had helped put the vulnerable countries at forefront of climate response, including pushing for 1.5 degrees goals in the Paris Agreement.
He said the secretariat would be working with the Ghana team on issues, including ensuring that the international communities delivered on their commitment to cut emissions and increase funding for adaptation.
Mr McKinnon said they would also help CVF leadership to formulate a strong position for COP 27 in Egypt.
