Published: 14:47, September 21, 2024 | Updated: 18:05, September 21, 2024
Climate finance by multilateral banks up to record $125b in 2023
By Xinhua
Smoke rises from the chimneys of the Suralaya coal-fired power plant in Cilegon, Indonesia, on Sept 14, 2023. (PHOTO / AFP)

MANILA – Multilateral development banks (MDBs) announced Friday in their joint report that their global climate finance reached a record high of $125 billion in 2023.

The joint report on MDBs climate finance said that last year, $74.7 billion of MDBs climate finance was directed toward low- and middle-income economies. Of this sum, 67 percent went to climate change mitigation and 33 percent for climate change adaptation. The amount of mobilized private finance stood at $28.5 billion.

In 2023, $50.3 billion was allocated for high-income economies, the report said. Of this amount, 94 percent was for climate change mitigation, and 6 percent for climate change adaptation.

The amount of mobilized private finance for high-income economies stood at $72.7 billion.

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Friday's announcement comes in the run-up to COP29, which will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan, in November. One of the key deliverables of COP29 is to increase global climate finance and reach an agreement on the new collective quantified goal of climate finance.

"We welcome the fact that MDBs provided record climate finance last year – every dollar of which makes a difference in helping to cut carbon emissions or preparing people and infrastructure for the worst impacts of climate change, much of which we must recognize is already baked in," said ADB Director General for Sustainable Development and Climate Change Bruno Carrasco.

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"There remains a large financing gap and ADB will continue to work closely with other MDBs – and in its own right – to get as much financing as possible to our developing member countries," said Carrasco.

The report is an annual collaboration to publish MDBs' climate finance figures, together with a clear explanation of the methodologies for tracking that finance.