Dr. Mahmoud Mohieldin, UN Climate Change High Level Champion for Egypt and UN Special Envoy on Financing 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, said that the world needs a new financial system that relies more on investments and reduces dependence on debt to finance development and climate action, especially in developing countries.
Mohieldin said, in a television interview with “Al Arabiya” on the sidelines of Paris Summit for a New Global Financial Pact, that achieving the sustainable development goals requires huge annual funding, while the implementation of the goal of confronting climate change alone requires funding of about $2.5 trillion annually, half of which is supposed to come from developing countries and $1 trillion from IFIs, MDBs and private sector.
He stressed the necessity of developing a new global financial system that contributes to increasing the capital of MDBs, reduces the cost of debt in developing countries, and depends on investment more than borrowing to finance development and climate action.
Mohieldin stated that there are ambitions to find a new financial pact that relieves the debt burdens of developing countries and helps them face climate change, explaining that there is an unjustified over-reliance on debt to finance climate action of up to 65% globally and 75% at the level of developing countries.
“Developing countries, the least contributing to climate crisis, are asked to borrow to finance their climate action and this is not fair.” Mohieldin said.
The climate champion emphasized that climate finance should focus on the renewable energy sector, and adaptation activities related to the sectors of agriculture, food security, water resources management, countering desertification, protecting forests and developing infrastructure.
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