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Climate Home News, 29th June 2018
Industrialised countries will cut funding for the Global Environment Facility (GEF) from $4.4 billion in 2014 to $4.1 billion for the four-year budget from 2018.
The main reason is that the US government has pledged to slash its contribution by almost half, from $546.25 million it paid in 2014 to $273.2 million.
The result will be a cut in projects by the green fund that was set up on the eve of the Rio Earth Summit in 1992, under the leadership of another Republican Party president of the US, George Bush Senior.
This is a serious setback because GEF has been one of the world’s major sources of green funding for developing countries. It has given $17.9 billion to support a whole range of projects that combat climate change, restore degraded farmlands, protect biodiversity, clean up toxic chemicals, reduce the amount of poisonous mercury in the environment, tackle wildlife trafficking and so on. Its small grants programme has helped farmers in various developing countries adapt to climate change impacts, especially water shortages.
