UNB, Dhaka :
Rich nations every year make commitments to provide necessary funds to poor countries for their climate adaptation, but they ultimately do little making their commitments a farce, allege experts.
“The rich countries pledge to provide fund for adaptation programmes in poor countries. But, they don’t live up to their promises…they make farce with climate vulnerable countries, giving a poor amount of money against their commitments,” executive director of the Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) Dr Iftekharuzzaman told UNB on Friday.
Bangladesh has been able to release only $1.07 billion to carry out adaptation programmes in the last six years (2010-August 2015) as it received only $ 75 million during the period, according to Bangladesh Climate Change Resilience Fund (BCCRF).
Data released by the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) in 2014 show that at least $ 150 billion will require a year globally to carry out adaptation programmes to cope with climate change impacts.
But, the industrialised countries released only $ 2.6 billion as of September 2015 against their promise of $ 30 billion, which is only 7.5 percent of their total commitment, said a TIB position paper.
Dr Iftekharuzzaman said Bangladesh along with other climate vulnerable countries should raise voice in the upcoming Paris climate conference and put pressure on rich counties to make more allocations to accelerate adaptation programmes in countries like Bangladesh.
Bangladesh, one of the world’s most disaster-prone climate vulnerable countries, has faced dozens of major disasters over its short history as a nation. Current research and studies suggest that flood, tropical cyclones, storm surge and drought are likely to be more frequent and severer in the years to come.
“Definitely, we should raise our voice in the Paris Climate summit to mount pressure on the rich nations to provide more funds for adaptation in our country as our coastal areas are highly vulnerable to sea-level rise,” said Malik Fida A Khan, director of Climate Change Division at Centre for Environmental and Geographic Information Services (CEGIS).
He said, the rich nations should not only provide fund to Bangladesh but also transfer technologies to make the country’s agriculture and water infrastructures climate smart.
Bangladesh needs to invest $ 40 billion from 2015 to 2030 to implement identified adaptation measures to address the adverse impacts of climate change, according to the Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC) of the government, submitted to the UNFCCC on September 2015.
The Climate Change Vulnerability Index (CCVI-2011) calculated the vulnerability of 170 countries to the impacts of climate change over the next 30 years, which reveals that Bangladesh is the most vulnerable country to climate change.
Saying climate change will drastically hamper Bangladesh’s economic growth, a recent report of the Asian Development Bank estimated that Bangladesh may experience 2 percent of annual GDP loss by 2050 because of climate change.
Rich nations every year make commitments to provide necessary funds to poor countries for their climate adaptation, but they ultimately do little making their commitments a farce, allege experts.
“The rich countries pledge to provide fund for adaptation programmes in poor countries. But, they don’t live up to their promises…they make farce with climate vulnerable countries, giving a poor amount of money against their commitments,” executive director of the Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) Dr Iftekharuzzaman told UNB on Friday.
Bangladesh has been able to release only $1.07 billion to carry out adaptation programmes in the last six years (2010-August 2015) as it received only $ 75 million during the period, according to Bangladesh Climate Change Resilience Fund (BCCRF).
Data released by the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) in 2014 show that at least $ 150 billion will require a year globally to carry out adaptation programmes to cope with climate change impacts.
But, the industrialised countries released only $ 2.6 billion as of September 2015 against their promise of $ 30 billion, which is only 7.5 percent of their total commitment, said a TIB position paper.
Dr Iftekharuzzaman said Bangladesh along with other climate vulnerable countries should raise voice in the upcoming Paris climate conference and put pressure on rich counties to make more allocations to accelerate adaptation programmes in countries like Bangladesh.
Bangladesh, one of the world’s most disaster-prone climate vulnerable countries, has faced dozens of major disasters over its short history as a nation. Current research and studies suggest that flood, tropical cyclones, storm surge and drought are likely to be more frequent and severer in the years to come.
“Definitely, we should raise our voice in the Paris Climate summit to mount pressure on the rich nations to provide more funds for adaptation in our country as our coastal areas are highly vulnerable to sea-level rise,” said Malik Fida A Khan, director of Climate Change Division at Centre for Environmental and Geographic Information Services (CEGIS).
He said, the rich nations should not only provide fund to Bangladesh but also transfer technologies to make the country’s agriculture and water infrastructures climate smart.
Bangladesh needs to invest $ 40 billion from 2015 to 2030 to implement identified adaptation measures to address the adverse impacts of climate change, according to the Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC) of the government, submitted to the UNFCCC on September 2015.
The Climate Change Vulnerability Index (CCVI-2011) calculated the vulnerability of 170 countries to the impacts of climate change over the next 30 years, which reveals that Bangladesh is the most vulnerable country to climate change.
Saying climate change will drastically hamper Bangladesh’s economic growth, a recent report of the Asian Development Bank estimated that Bangladesh may experience 2 percent of annual GDP loss by 2050 because of climate change.
