GEF to take on wider role in climate finance

The Global Environment Facility (GEF) has requested a wider role in environmental protection and a tightening of commodity supply chains from farmers to consumers.

The GEF has 183 member states and has provided US$13.5 billion in grants to developing nations since 1991.

Naoko Ishii, Chief Executive Officer at the GEF has highlighted how efforts to safeguard tropical forests from land clearance to make way for, as an example, palm oil plantations have been hampered by a lack of oversight.

Ishii outlined how the involvement of banks in reducing forest clearances would be crucial in order to prevent lending to loggers on protected land, as well as small farm owners, governments and big companies such as Nestle SA or Unilever.

The GEF was set up in 1991 as a World Bank pilot programme and Ishii said the organisation is willing to help take on a wider coordinating role.

Speaking at the UN Climate Change Conference in Lima, Peru last week, Ishii said: “What is missing is maybe somebody that brings every stakeholder together. My next target is how to put economic value to this natural capital and how to link it up to the international institutions, capital markets.”

Ishii said she is not concerned that the GEF would be overshadowed by the UN’s Green Climate Fund, which has secured almost US$10 billion in pledges to help developing nations cope with climate change.

The GEF has a broader role than just climate and is makes investments to protect the diversity of plant and animal life by helping setting up parks and other protected areas.