By External Source
Hanoi and Ouagadougou, Dec 11 2020 (IPS-Partners)

The Kigali Cooling Efficiency Program (K-CEP), a philanthropic collaboration, has selected the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) as technical assistance providers to improve access to and the efficiency of cooling in Burkina Faso and Viet Nam.

K-CEP was launched in 2017 to support the Kigali Amendment of the Montreal Protocol and the transition to efficient, clean cooling solutions for all.

In Burkina Faso, GGGI will work closely with the government and a network of local partners to reduce energy demand and enhance energy efficiency in the housing sector and deliver a replicable and scalable program on sustainable cooling. Through this two-year project, titled “The Social Housing Energy Efficiency Cooling Program,” which will receive a total grant of USD 617,000, GGGI will support the government to reduce GHG emissions from cooling and while simultaneously increasing access to cooling in the residential housing sector. The project will commence on January 1, 2021 and continue until December 31, 2023.

“We plan to collaborate with the Government of Burkina Faso to implement and develop architectural and structural solutions in the National Housing Program, which will bring benefits for 40,000 housing units. We hope to scale up the solutions in the housing and raise the cooling NDC’s ambitions. I am confident that the project will serve as a reference point for the Sahel region,” explained Malle Fofana, GGGI’s Country Representative for Burkina Faso.

In Viet Nam, the government recognizes the role of efficient and clean cooling as part of the country’s climate change policies. HE. Tran Hong Ha, Minister of Natural Resources & Environment, emphasized that “The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment will cooperate with line ministries and stakeholders to mainstream climate-friendly cooling in relevant national legislation and policies, and its application in relevant sectors.”

To support this vision, UNEP and GGGI will collaborate with Viet Nam’s Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (MONRE) on a project entitled “Sustainable Urban Cooling in Viet Nam cities” which will be funded by K-CEP a total grant of USD 1 million. The project, which will start in 2021 for a period of 3 years, aims to contribute to improving urban cooling design through hands-on policy support, capacity building as well as piloting various business models and engaging with the private sector.

“We expect to link this project into enhanced NDC implementation and its results into future iterations of Viet Nam’s NDC”, affirmed Mr. Tang The Cuong, Director-General, Department of Climate Change (MONRE).

Hanh Le, GGGI’s Country Representative for Viet Nam emphasized that “With K-CEP funding, this project will bring sustainable cooling to the forefront of the country’s climate agenda. We are committed to working with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment and supporting the local governments to enhance access to green investments for urban cooling.”

“Urban populations globally face severe risks from extreme heat and, at the same time, it is in cities that we see strongest growth in demand for cooling. Local governments can take a far stronger role in protecting populations from extreme heat and delivering sustainable cooling solutions. However, they need to be enabled and have the finance and capacity to act. This financial support from K-CEP and political commitment from MoNRE is highly welcomed and timely and will allow us to prepare a replicable, sustainable model for cities to take concerted action on cooling and extreme heat,” said Lily Riahi, Programme Manager, Cities Unit, Energy & Climate Branch, UNEP.

Ultimately, the project will support replication in other cities of Viet Nam and contribute to national-level commitments and policies on sustainable urban cooling.

On a final note, Lily Riahi added that “By joining the Cool Coalition, Viet Nam is now part of a unified global front, aiming to seize the opportunity of efficient and climate friendly cooling. Through the Cool Coalition, the lessons from Viet Nam on urban cooling and extreme heat can be shared globally and benefit from learnings from other countries.”

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On Thursday 20 and Friday 21 February, the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) in partnership with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation (MONREC) and the University of Queensland (UQ) held a validation workshop on the 3Returns Model and Framework, presenting an Investment Case for Coastal Landscape Mangrove Restoration in Myanmar through the findings from an Economic Appraisal of Ayeyarwady Mangrove Forests, Bio-based Value Chains for Mangrove Restoration and Benefit Sharing Mechanisms. The event proved informative for both participants and presenters alike, providing critical insights and opening dialogue between multiple government departments.

The Importance of Mangroves on the Ayeyarwady Delta

The mangroves of the Ayeyarwady Delta are an important natural resource for local residents as well as the nation-at-large. They provide significant ecological, social and economic benefits. Ecologically, mangrove habitats provide breeding grounds and hatcheries for birds, fish, crustaceans and other organisms. Additionally, mangroves constitute a major source of carbon sequestration, making them an important asset for Myanmar’s climate change mitigation.

Mangrove forests support coastal disaster resilience through their protection of communities from inundation from tidal surges and strong winds. Importantly, for neighbouring communities, mangroves also provide economic benefits. The collection of fuelwood, fish and crustaceans supplements the incomes of many people in the delta, with products reaching as far afield as China. However, not all members of local communities have been able to share in the benefit from these activities, in particular landless – who account for 73% of people in coastal areas – and women.

Above: U Hla Maung Thein, Director General Environmental Conservation Department – ‘conservation of mangroves is a national responsibility’

The mangroves’ positive impacts have been degraded by unsustainable land use practices. Less than 10,000 hectares of good quality mangroves exist within a total habitat range of 85,000 hectares. This degradation has largely occurred as a result of illegal logging and fuelwood extraction and the conversion of mangrove habitat into agricultural rice paddy and large-scale shrimp ponds. The significance of the mangroves of the Ayeyarwady Delta from an ecological, social and economic perspective highlights the need for a change in landscape management practises in order to preserve their benefits.

Above: Dr. Aaron Russell, GGGI Country Representative delivering welcome remark

In order to assess sustainable landscape management practices and support green growth alternatives for the local communities, the Global Green Growth Institute has developed a 3Returns Model and Framework for analysing different green growth forest governance scenarios compared with continuation of current practices, known as a “Business as Usual” (BAU) scenario. The 3Returns Framework provides a holistic approach which considers each intervention’s benefits through natural capital, social and human capital as well as economic/financial capital. It differs from a Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) as the Return on Investment Analysis considers not only financial investment but also natural, social and human investment. This allows measuring a Return on Investment Ratio that considers the benefits from investment in capitals and defines a desired intervention scenario measured as the most efficient when compared with the Business as Usual (BAU) scenario. It also differs from a CBA as the Return on Investment Analysis also quantifies non-monetary benefits and capitals’ status as indicators for decision making.

The Economic Appraisal of Ayeyarwady Mangrove Forests used the 3Returns approach to consider four policy intervention scenarios. A key difference between each scenario was the percentage of land allocated between the two types of community user groups by 2026. The two community user groups types are Village Woodlots (VW) and Community Forest User Groups (CFUG). All the scenarios other than BAU implement the enhanced Myanmar Reforestation and Rehabilitation Program (MRRP).

The scenarios were the following:

1. Scenario 1, allocates 11% of mangroves to be managed by CFUG and an annual increase in area under VW management until 2026. The maximum community forestry mangrove area is 35% of the Reserve Forest area.
2. Scenario 2, allocates 25% of mangrove management to VW and 25% mangrove management to CFUG. The community forestry mangrove area is 50% of the Reserve Forest area.
3. Scenario 3, allocates 47% of mangroves to CFUG and only 3% to VWs. The community forestry mangrove area is 50% of the Reserve Forest area.
4. Scenario 4, allocates 39% of mangroves to be managed VWs and 11% to be managed by CFUGs. The community forestry mangrove area is 50% of the Reserve Forest area.

There are important differences between these two forms of community management. VW officially remain under the control of the Forestry Department, but are a community managed common with a mandate for sustainably managing logging/fuelwood production. They are regarded as democratic in structure, giving all local people the ability to influence decision making. An important aim of VWs is to reduce poverty through enabling community participation for marginalised groups.

CFUGs are less democratic in structure. They only require five people to form a group to apply for a land permit – as a result they have the potential to be susceptible to elite capture. CFUGs enable groups to participate in a wider range of activities including agriculture, aquaculture as well as logging.

CFUGs have a low rate of female participation – only 8% of female headed households are involved. The level of female participation in VWs is not yet know.

The results of the analysis revealed that scenarios 2,3 and 4 achieved roughly the same outcomes in terms of natural capital and net present value. However, Scenario 4 achieved the highest social and human capital not-monetary benefits, resulting in the engagement of 48,618 people in community forestry and capacity building by 2026. Furthermore, when analysing the loss of informal jobs and livelihoods through improved resource management scenarios, Scenario 4 shows the least reduction in jobs and livelihoods (64,978) compared to BAU (65,008). For this reason, the report concludes Scenario 4 is the most desirable landscape management strategy which best takes into account natural, social & human and economic capital benefits.

It must be noted that all scenarios are anticipated to reduce illegal logging activity. However, the removal of this activity will disproportionately affect poorer, landless groups who previously relied on mangrove resources to supplement their income. It is important that community management design incorporates these stakeholders, incentivising them to undertake sustainable activities with the larger landscape system.

Value Chain Interventions

In addition to analysing the impacts of forest governance structures, the report has identified two viable value chains which incentivise the conservation of mangroves. The two value chains are hard-shell mud crab and dried products through the implementation of solar dome dryers.

The hard-shell mud crab value chain provides a lucrative opportunity to connect people of the Ayeyarwady Delta with the markets of China. In 2016, the trade was valued at over 4 Million Euros. Currently 90% of mud crabs are exported to China. Mature crabs can reach over 20,000MMK/kg in local and export market. The value chain currently consists of small-scale village catchers and hatcheries, pond owners and farmers, and middlemen/traders who connect the crabs to markets in Yangon and China.

The financial assessment showed that primarily the pond owners/farmers and middlemen/traders are benefiting from the activity. The middlemen often provide informal finance to poor people engaged in crab catching. As part of this arrangement, debtors are required to provide juvenile crabs at discounted rates to the middlemen. However, the middlemen have also been found to provide equipment and interest free loans to the small-scale village catchers.

The middlemen gain from the higher prices associated with larger crabs through fattening them, earning a profit.

Several actions are required to fully realise the green growth opportunity of this value chain. Firstly, it is important that hatcheries are developed so that the natural populations of mud crabs are not depleted through overharvesting.

Secondly, it is important that an alternative pellet feed for the crabs are produced. Currently ‘trash fish’, small fish with no other practical use, are fed to the crabs. They are a cheap source of food for crab fattening; however, ongoing use of the resource could also have negative effects on fish stocks. Another reason to emphases the importance of feed is the cannibalistic nature of crabs – not feeding the crabs and relying on natural feeding results in an increased crab mortality rate. Investing in crab feeding enables crab farmers to operationally perform better.

Providing financial support to communities at the farmer production stage of the value chain will hopefully allow them to share in the benefits of the value chain by enabling them to grow crabs to larger sizes and receive higher prices than what is currently demanded by the middlemen.

An additional reason to prioritise this intervention is its capacity to empower women. Often it is women who are in charge of the crab ponds.

Left: Intensive hard-shell mud crab fattening; right: natural hard-shell mud crab fattening

Dried products through the implementation of a solar dome dryer is another intervention in the value chain which will assist in protecting mangrove habitat. It achieves this by reducing the amount of fuelwood which is sourced from mangroves required to dry fish, crustaceans, and other agroforestry products. There is also an indication that the dryer dome increases the success rate and quality of preservation, which will be hoped to increase the price at sale.

Dried shrimp production modelling from the report found that if drying occurred for 180 days within a solar dryer dome, the amount of fuelwood required would be 40% less than current drying methods. Savings from fuelwood are reduced to 15% if the facility is operated at its maximum capacity during the year (for 260 days).

Solar dome dryers are estimated to have a life-span of 10 years and are suitable for community-level or user group association investments as they are too expensive for one person to purchase. Through the increased efficiencies in drying and input use, the analysis based on dried shrimp found that most communities would be able to pay off their investment loan in less than 2 years.

Above: traditional sun-drying process of shrimp in Ayeyarwady Delta

Workshop Insights from Policy maker

A number of interesting insights arose during discussions and activities at the workshop. One observation made by a government participant was the need for more co-ordination and dialogue between government departments. There are multiple government departments which have jurisdiction over the Ayeyarwady Delta, often with significant overlap and conflicting policies and procedures. A possible solution to this problem was based on a delegate’s personal experience. They highlighted the need to firstly locate the conservation area, then discuss with other departments to consolidate laws and enforcement.

Another interesting insight relates to attendees’ perceptions of different management types (e.g. BAU, MRRP, VWs, CFUG). There was a broad understanding that BAU is untenable for mangrove landscape restoration, especially in regards to livelihoods and mangrove restoration. However, there was a recognition that it provides some beneficial employment opportunities though some of these are unsustainable or illegal.

Participants generally had positive perceptions on MRRP, CFUG and VWs. Despite the beneficial nature of VWs in terms of participation, conservation and job creation, the survey revealed on average a larger preference towards MRRP and CFUG by participants. In particular, this was displayed in the results in the livelihood and mangrove restoration sections.

This prompts the need for further advocacy on the benefits of inclusive and democratic institutions based off the principle of free, prior and informed consent of local stakeholders. This message should focus on the weakness of government management of forest reserves (MRRP) in order to convince the government to allocate more mangrove habitat to CFUGs and VWs for management. In all, the workshop was a success as it progressed the green growth agenda in the Ayeyarwady Delta.

Above: Group activity during workshop

By Frank Rijsberman and Ingvild Solvang
SEOUL, South Korea, Mar 9 2020 (IPS)

This year, the Paris Agreement’s effectiveness as a global response to the climate crisis is being tested as governments are preparing to submit more ambitious national targets for mitigation and adaptation.

The combined ambitions of these targets should match the urgency to strengthening resilience and limiting the disastrous climate change impacts around the world.

The Paris Agreement aims to keep global warming well below 2°C and closer to 1.5°C compared with pre-industrial levels. This means reaching a peak in global emissions shortly and achieving climate neutrality by 2050, in other words target Net Zero Emissions by 2050.

Achieving this requires stepping up immediate actions that follow new models of economic growth and development that shift policies and investments towards low-carbon, green growth solutions.

Promotion of poverty alleviation, gender equality and social inclusion is embedded in GGGI’s support to our member countries in this transition. This is in recognition that achievement of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) for the Paris Agreement must align with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) priorities.

Mounting evidence shows that gender equality is an accelerator of development and of climate action, and GGGI suggests two key priorities for International Women’s Day 2020.

First, increased investments in climate change adaptation are essential for livelihoods, food security and disaster risk reduction, particularly to benefit women and girls, who are disproportionally impacted by climate change.

Second, “A Just Transition” is needed, particularly in renewable energy, to ensure enhanced opportunities world over for women to participate in decision-making and the economy.

Women and girls are more vulnerable to the Climate Crisis

The climate crisis impacts men and women differently and given their different roles in society. In the most climate vulnerable communities, women’s work and activities tend to be dependent on natural resources, and climate change results in more effort and time required to collect water, firewood, and secure food for the household.

Lack of access to sustainable energy services and productive assets and financial resources are key barriers to the ability of communities to adapt to a changing climate. With limited roles in community and household decision-making, and with lesser access to services and resources globally, women are further disadvantaged.

A study by McKinsey estimates that although women constitute 50% of the global population, they contribute only 37% to the global (formal) economy. Only 24.5% of the world’s parliamentarians are women.

And, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), only 15% of the world’s landowners are female. Therefore, GGGI is working to make climate action work to accelerate gender equality by promoting gender-responsive plans, policies, technologies and investments.

In Myanmar’s Ayeyarwady Delta, mangrove forests are essential to people’s lives and livelihoods. The Cyclone Nargis that hit the Delta in 2008 claimed more than 130,000 lives.

Consistent with a tragic global disaster pattern, 61% of those dead were female with the number much higher in some villages according to a 2014 post-disaster assessment undertaken by the Government of Myanmar and partners. This illustrates the gendered nature of climate disasters.

A UNWOMEN and UNDP review of evidence highlights how integrated approaches to political and economic empowerment are needed to support women participation and leadership in climate action, which in turns enhances their resilience. In the context of the Myanmar Delta, mangrove conservation is an essential response to the climate crisis.

GGGI is incorporating these gender perspectives into its work with the government on developing the case for community-led forest management, to safeguard men and women’s equal leadership and sustainable access to forest resources. In parallel, investments in fishery value chains could have significant positive impacts on rural women’s livelihoods through access to finance, technology and markets.

Women Have Untapped Potential in the Transition to Renewable Energy

A transition to renewable energy is essential to fight the climate crisis. About three-quarters of the first generation of NDCs made reference to renewable energy, and this focus is likely to increase as governments submit more ambitious targets and as the price of renewable energy has come down significantly in the last 5 years since the first generation of NDCs was prepared.

This shift requires a “just transition”, i.e. support for those who lose their jobs in the brown economy in the shift towards a green economy, to ensure a broad-based political will and public support for driving decarbonization of the economy.

GGGI has assessed the potential for green job creation in Mexico, Indonesia and Rwanda as a result of the switch to renewable energy in the NDCs of these countries, and found that considerable employment and economic opportunities can be created.

For example, achieving Mexico’s renewable energy targets under the NDCs would create 370,000 additional jobs compared to the business-as-usual scenario. While the number of green jobs gained will likely outpace the numbers of brown jobs lost, those losing their brown jobs are not the same people as those gaining new green jobs, and therefore a just transition is key.

Furthermore, by acknowledging the gender dimension of the renewable energy sub-sector, policymakers have an opportunity to ensure that women can participate in this expanding green labor force on equal terms as their male counterparts.

An IRENA report from 2019 estimates that only 32% of the current global renewable energy workforce are women and that the gender gap is even wider in technical and senior roles. In a 2020 report on the emerging wind energy sector, IRENA concludes women constitute only 21% of the workforce in this sub-sector, which is even lower that the global average for women in oil and gas (22%).

The reasons for these gender gaps are complex, and the NDC can be an important instrument to pair climate targets with socio-economic co-benefits and women’s empowerment.

A first step towards closing this gender gap is to have better quality gender data to drive responsive polices, for example in public procurement criteria that stimulate women’s participation in the RE workforce, conducive workplace policies, and measures to increase the number of women in energy-related education.

In the Mexican State of Sonora, where 21% of the energy workforce are women, GGGI has engaged with a broad range of public and private sector stakeholders to explore opportunities for gender equality in renewable energy sector. This should ensure a broader talent-base for a growing sector.

At the same time, Mexico has one of the world’s largest gender gaps in employment generally, and increased women’s participation could therefore significantly contribute to economic growth and increased welfare.

In conclusion, while gender equality and women’s empowerment are goals, they are also essential enablers of climate action and development more broadly. While upping climate ambitions in 2020, we must also step up our efforts to unlock the potential of women and girls around the world.

Excerpt:

By GGGI
Mar 3 2020 (IPS-Partners)

The Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) has partnered with the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) and the Peruvian Society for Environmental Law (SPDA) to support Peru’s efforts to reduce deforestation through an innovative approach that promotes sustainable agroforestry practices and secures land tenure of small farmers in the Amazon.

Representatives from the Government of Norway, GGGI, ICRAF and the SPDA, gathered in Lima to mark the start of a 3-year project whose objective is to provide technical, legal, financial and institutional support to help the Government of Peru implement the Agroforestry Concessions system.

Among those present were Thorstein Wangen, Advisor for Climate and Forestry of the Royal Embassy of Norway concurrently accredited in Peru, Elise Christensen, the Senior Advisor for the Norway International Climate and Forest Initiative (NICFI), Einer Telnes, NORAD Senior Advisor of the Department for Climate, Energy and Environment, as well as Aaron Drayer, the GGGI Peru Country Representative, along with the GGGI teams and project leadership from ICRAF and SPDA.

Agroforestry Concessions are an innovative legal mechanism that seeks to incorporate family farmers in the forest economy by offering those that occupy land in the public forest domain a forty-year usufruct contract over land and tree resources. Their possession is conditioned upon halting deforestation and implementing sustainable land use, including agroforestry.

The project’s expected impacts are to reduce deforestation and carbon emissions in the Peruvian Amazon, promote restoration through agroforestry of previously deforested land, and improve livelihoods of vulnerable small-scale farmers at the forest frontier. It is estimated that Agroforestry Concessions could benefit more than 120,000 families that are currently farming over 1.5 million hectares of forest land.

Successful implementation of Agroforestry Concessions will require the coordination of multiple sectors and governance levels to support the transition of family farmers at deforestation frontiers to engage in sustainable land-use practices that are also financially sound. For this reason, the consortium team will work hand in hand with the Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation, the Peru Forestry and Wildlife Service and the Ministry of Environment, as well as Amazonian regional governments.

In the meeting, consortium members and the representatives of the Government of Norway discussed the importance of a multi-stakeholder process to ensure that the Agroforestry Concessions system is successful. Mr. Aaron Drayer indicated how the consortium represents a sum of complementary expertise and approaches to respond to that complexity.

The representatives of the Government of Norway highlighted the importance of this new mechanism to help Peru comply with its climate change commitments under the Paris Agreement. Mr. Thorstein Wangen highlighted the importance of engagement with government actors at all levels and connecting the project to public policies. And. Mr. Einer Telnes stressed the importance of this new system to support the Government of Peru towards its zero-deforestation goal. He also emphasized the opportunity for other countries to learn from the Peruvian experience promoting agroforestry, securing land rights and improving farmers’ livelihoods.

Finally, Elise Christensen pointed out that the project’s approach is built upon an in-depth understanding of the complexities of land use at the agricultural frontier and that it focuses on a model that relies more on recognizing land tenure rights for farmers and providing financial incentives than on command and control models.

GGGI and the consortium partners will work closely with the National Forest and Wildlife Service (SERFOR), the Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation (MINAGRI), the Ministry of the Environment (MINAM) and key regional governments to help build the enabling financial, legal, institutional and technical conditions for the successful implementation of the new Agroforestry Concessions system for family farmers in the Peruvian Amazon.

By GGGI
PARIS, Jan 22 2020 (IPS-Partners)

The Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) signed a Declaration of Intent and a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the French Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs (MEAE) and the Agence Française de Développement (AFD), a French development bank today to promote sustainable development and climate action. The signing was witnessed by Mr. Ban Ki-moon, President and Chair of GGGI.

The MoUs complement the joint declaration of the France-Korea Summit in 2018 where the two countries pledged to support GGGI’s activities and efforts to accelerate the adoption of green growth models in developing and emerging countries.

“This is the first time GGGI has signed MoUs with the Government of France and a French development bank. The cooperation agreements we signed today will be a start of our collaboration, bringing opportunities on a number of fronts. We look forward to strengthening our partnerships with the MEAE and AFD to support countries achieve solid and ambitious Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) for the Paris Agreement,” said Dr. Frank Rijsberman, Director-General of GGGI.

Meeting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and setting ambitious climate action targets require strong partnerships and collaboration between development partners. The MEAE plans to promote collaboration between AFD and GGGI with regards to joint funding programs.

Remy Rioux, Director-General of AFD said, “We are delighted to work together with GGGI to build innovative green investments mechanisms, especially in Africa as one of the most vulnerable regions to climate change despite contributing the least to global warming. By partnering with GGGI, I am confident that we will create synergies and support countries to deliver on Paris Agreement commitments.”

Under the MoU, GGGI and AFD have agreed to collaborate through undertaking several financing operations to promote sustainable economic development in developing and emerging countries, including the least developed countries. The two organizations seek to deliver economic growth that is both environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive. GGGI and AFD will help countries access climate finance to implement ambitious climate actions with a focus on the development of National Financing Vehicles. In addition, the two organizations will enhance countries’ NDC planning and implementation by providing support for long-term low-carbon and resilient economic development strategies/plans and Monitoring, Review and Verification (MRV) systems.

GGGI will strengthen its commitment to French-speaking developing countries to achieve their climate action goals, including the implementation of their NDCs, the formulation of resilient and low-carbon long-term economic development strategies, and the development of reliable systems for measuring, reporting and verifying greenhouse gas emissions.

“The signing of the Declaration of Intent comes at a time when there is an urgent need to take action in addressing global warming, which is in line with the commitments of the Paris Climate Agreement and 2030 Agenda,” said Philippe Lacoste, Director for Sustainable Development, MEAE.

GGGI will support countries to accelerate access to climate finance, particularly by developing innovative green investment funds and mechanisms, facilitating these countries to access the Green Climate Fund (GCF), as well as working together on the development of portfolio of green bankable projects.

MADRID – 4th December 2019 – Today, the Swedish Energy Agency (SEA) and the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) signed a cooperation agreement on the sidelines of COP25 to launch the Mobilizing Article 6 Trading Structures (MATS) Program, a pilot project aimed at establishing Article 6 Activities under the Paris Agreement. The objective of this joint collaboration is to catalyze international trading of mitigation outcomes in support of the increased climate ambitions needed under the Paris Agreement. 

Under the agreement, SEA and GGGI will work to identify and structure mitigation activities and support the establishment of  governance frameworks within host countries as required under the developing rulebook of Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, with the goal of completing transactions of internationally transferred mitigation outcomes (ITMOs). How countries count the transfer of carbon credits (known as ITMOs) toward mitigation targets is crucial to avoiding double counting.

Although specific rules related to cooperative approaches under Article 6 have yet to be codified, Article 6 aims at supporting the authorization of international emissions trades while avoiding double counting and ensuring environmental integrity, permitting the movement of the related emission reductions between registries, and better linking national emission trading schemes, project-level transactions, and cooperative approaches.

“The Swedish Energy Agency is committed to supporting the global effort to reduce emissions to meet the Paris Agreement’s long-term goals and contribute to its implementation. As part of that commitment SEA is working hard to usher in a new wave of national and sectoral scale mitigation activities. With everything we have learned during the Kyoto Period, we feel that we have a lot to offer in terms of knowledge and lessons learned to be pioneers in the post 2020 period. We are thrilled to partner with GGGI in order to achieve common goals and overcome some of the inevitable challenges faced by early actors,” said Robert Andrén, Director General of the Swedish Energy Agency.

The SEA-GGGI MATS program takes a holistic approach towards supporting countries to refine existing – or create new, institutional frameworks, to make them Article 6 compliant and assess the mitigation potential of activities, and test the design of the framework through practical authorization of ITMO transactions under Mitigation Outcome Purchase Agreements (MOPAs).

 “GGGI is delighted to partner with SEA on this pioneering journey to help countries achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement. The MATS program, a new priority area of work, will build on GGGI’s technical assistance   with Member and partners to support their achievement of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and further increase ambition through readiness activities, accessing climate finance and establishing Measurement, Reporting, and Verification (MRV) systems. Through its model of being embedded within government and working with partners, we feel that GGGI is well positioned to deliver the program in collaboration with SEA; leveraging on their wealth of experience in carbon markets,” said Susanne Pedersen, GGGI’s Assistant Director-General  and Head of Investment and Policy Services Division (IPSD).

The 3-year partnership builds on SEA’s work in developing capacity in low- and middle-income countries to implement mitigation activities bilaterally and via multilateral engagements.  Virtual pilots have been developed in a number of countries and core issues such as additionality, pricing, corresponding adjustments, and attribution have been studied in recent years. The MATS program was initiated and launched with intentions of building on this work to achieve implementable activities that produce transactable mitigation outcomes, which will be identified jointly by GGGI and SEA and then be developed against the emerging rulebook of Article 6. In addition, governance frameworks will be developed to establish sustainable mechanisms to allow approval of further transactions. Finally, activity stakeholders will establish the underlying architecture needed for successful signing of MOPAs and activity implementation.

GGGI is already engaged on Article 6-related activities with several donors, working with the Ministry of Climate and Environment of Norway on wider policy approaches and identifying potential transactions for the Klik Foundation program for Switzerland.

About SEA

SEA supports the Swedish Government and Society as well as external actors with facts, knowledge, and analysis of supply and use of energy in Sweden.  SEA provides funding for research on new and renewable energy technologies, smart grids, as well as vehicles and transport fuels. SEA also supports business development that promotes commercialisation of energy related innovations and ensures that promising cleantech solutions can be exported.  Official energy statistics, and the management of instruments such as the Electricity Certificate System and the EU Emission Trading System, are part of SEA’s responsibility.

Furthermore, SEA has long been the home of Sweden’s CDM and JI program; and is now actively participating in international climate collaborations under the Paris Agreement.

About GGGI

Based in Seoul, GGGI is a treaty-based international, inter-governmental organization that supports developing country governments transition to a model of economic growth that is environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive. GGGI delivers programs for 33 Members and partners – in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and the Pacific – with technical support, capacity building, policy planning and implementation, and by helping to build a pipeline of bankable green investment projects. To learn more about GGGI, see http://www.gggi.org and follow us on Facebook , Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram.

The Coalition for Urban Transitions recently released a report titled Climate Emergency, Urban Opportunity: How national governments can secure economic prosperity and avert climate catastrophe by transforming cities. The report indicates the numerous benefits of prioritizing zero-carbon cities and provides national governments with six key priorities for actions to take to achieve a successful urban transition.

The key findings by the report indicated that zero carbon cities can bring significant economic advantages, indicating that “investments in low-carbon measures in cities would provide a return of at least US$23.9 trillion by 2050”.

Climate Emergency, Urban Opportunity quantifies the social, environmental, and economic benefits that are available to national governments who invest in zero-carbon cities. Under the overarching message that “National governments that prioritize zero-carbon cities today will secure economic prosperity and better living standards tomorrow,” the report provides original data analysis and case studies of successful national and local collaborations to improve the quality of urban life and features how a rapid urban transition is possible with engagement from national governments.

The report suggests six key priorities on which national governments should act:

• Develop an overarching strategy to deliver shared prosperity while reaching net-zero emissions – and place cities at its heart.

• Align national policies behind compact, connected, clean cities.

• Fund and finance sustainable urban infrastructure.

• Coordinate and support local climate action in cities.

• Build a multilateral system that fosters inclusive, zero-carbon cities.

• Proactively plan for a just urban transition.

Beyond its messages to national governments of the benefits the transition brings, the report also depicts the price of inaction; as the global temperature increases, so does the threat it poses to both countries and cities. A key message of the report states that “the battle for our future will be won or lost in cities. Cities are home to more than half the world’s population and are responsible for 80% of global GDP – and three quarters of energy-related carbon emissions”.

Today, only a handful of countries have a national strategy for cities. Therefore, the report seeks to elicit action from national governments to change this, for countries to create resilient, prosperous cities, further economic development, and effectively respond to the climate emergency.

GGGI’s Head of Green Cities, Donovan Storey, and Green Cities Officer, Aarsi Sagar, contributed to the newly released Climate Emergency, Urban Opportunity report by the Coalition for Urban Transitions, which is the leading global initiative dedicated to supporting national governments unlock the economic power of inclusive, zero-carbon cities. GGGI was one of 50 leading international organizations that collaborated on the report ahead of the Climate Action Summit and Sustainable Development Goals Summit in New York.

To read the entire report, key messages, priorities for national governments, and more information, visit here: https://urbantransitions.global/en/publication/climate-emergency-urban-opportunity/

Credit: Fanabc

By GGGI
Sep 19 2019 (IPS-Partners)

In 2019, the Ethiopia government, led by Prime Minster Dr. Abiy Ahmed, launched the ambitious Green Legacy campaign that set a milestone to plant 200 million tree seedlings within 12 hours as integral part of an annual target to plant 4 billion tree seedlings.

July 29, 2019 was declared to be Green Legacy day, which aimed to plant 200 million seedlings in a day countrywide by all stakeholders based on the Prime Minister declaration to all Ethiopian citizens, governmental and Non-governmental institutions, Civil and Private organizations, Embassies, Agencies and others. Subsequently, the GGGI Ethiopia country office joined the campaign, with Environment, Forest and Climate Change Commission (EFCCC) as a key partner on the country’s green growth initiatives, to be part of this historic event.

This campaign has shown substantial government dedications towards green development actions, mobilizing stakeholders and forest development initiatives as a country.

Following the Prime Minster national call, a core national technical committee was established and led this campaign to coordinate and ensure tree planting activities across different parts of the country properly and effectively at respective planting sites.

Moreover, a national archive and communication center was established to record and communicate planting tallies as they happen on the site through the application of GPS and modern communication technology. National and international medias have recorded and broadcasted the events, which enabled global outreach to demonstrate Ethiopia’s efforts and achievements on tree planting.

Credit: Fanabc

The core technical team disclosed the outcome that both targets have been met, in which annual achievement has reached more than 4 billion seedlings. It’s also reported that more than 350 million seedlings have been plated on a single day, which was recorded to be the world’s highest tree seedling planting event ever.

This is a significant measure for Ethiopia to address forest problems, especially to reduce deforestation and enhance forest development, and thereby, improve forest goods and services that have crucial social, economic and environmental roles.

Various scholars have reported that historically, Ethiopia is said to have about 40% forest coverage, which currently has declined to less than half. A recent EFCCC report indicated that Ethiopia has about 15.5 percent forest cover. Apparently, no one would argue about the fact that Ethiopia forest resources have been declining in size and quality through time and deficit between annual forest gain and loss.

Credit: Fanabc

For Ethiopia, forest development and management is not a matter of choice, rather it’s compulsory to ensure sustainable development and to achieve overarching Climate Resilient Green Economy (CRGE) and Growth Transformation Plan (GTP) strategies.

Ethiopia’s land features are characterized by mountainous and rugged topographic landscapes that are suitable for natural resources conservation including flora and fauna, water reservoirs and multiple functions.  Therefore, landscapes and watersheds management though natural regeneration and restoration have important contributions for the country and beyond the territory. For instance, forestry development has a critical role to address climate changes effects through mitigation and adaptation measures, which have national and international significance.

Credit: Fanabc

Ethiopia hydro dams have been under serious challenges due to watershed degradations that led to soil erosion and siltation that impacts electricity generation and power supply. In turn, this has been impacting industry and manufacturing sectors due to power shortages, which have direct implications on the economy and livelihoods.

Afforestation and reforestation activities reduce wood supply and demand gaps, as Ethiopian rural communities significantly depend on the forest products for their livelihood, which includes income generation, construction materials, energy, farm tools, foods and so on, both for home consumption and commercial uses. Agroforestry practices have critical roles to improve land management and productivity, which contribute to household incomes and reducing forest pressure.

The forest sector is one of the four pillars under the CRGE strategy to promote green growth development and address climate change mitigation actions.  Generally, this forest development action has multiple contributions and effects that encompasses social, economic and environmental aspects at local, national and global scales.

Credit: Fanabc

This event is the beginning of long journey, which requires building on this momentum and transforming it into an institutional and strategic approach to realize the intended objectives. It’s believed that the ultimate goal of tree planting is to enhance forest resources to provide improved goods and services sustainably.

Hence, it needs silvicultural and management interventions, scientific knowledge and technology to devise a sustainable management system, demonstrate economic contributions and impacts, forest products value addition and benefit sharing mechanisms, technical supports and law enforcement, knowledge management and sharing on best practices and lessons.

Finally, beyond the accomplishment, this is a lesson that demonstrates how leadership, coordination and joint efforts can make a difference on a pertinent issue. Furthermore, it’s good to reiterate that many individuals, organizations and countries have witnessed how the Ethiopia Green Legacy action has been landmark and exemplary. With this, GGGI commends and is honored to be part of this event and looks forward to further supporting the country’s inclusive green growth efforts.

Kathmandu at night

By GGGI
Sep 18 2019 (IPS-Partners)

Sonika Manandhar, Aeloi Technologies’ co-founder, knows the Kathmandu public transportation system inside out. Her family has been running micros (vans that operate as buses) as a business for over twenty years. She also insists on taking public transportation every day, although most of her peers in the technology industry rather save up and buy a motorbike. “Buses are just safer and more environmentally friendly,” says Sonika. “Unfortunately, all the buses, micros, and tempos stop after 8 pm. Then taxis or motorcycle hailing apps are the only options. I don’t feel safe with either, so I often miss out on networking opportunities or professional meetings over dinner,” she adds.

Sonika trying to negotiate with a taxi driver

Sonika’s frustrations inspired our team to dig deeper into the public transportation industry. We found out that Kathmandu is actually a green city pioneer, with over 700 electric minibuses, locally called safa tempos, that have been steadily servicing the city for 20 years. This industry is uniquely suited to Nepal because of Nepal’s immense hydropower potential, which is predicted to be sufficient for all electricity and fossil fuel use in the country by 2020. In particular, safa tempos are majority owned and operated by women, even though the rest of the public transportation sector is dominated by men. Aeloi’s team thought: what a perfect industry for us to start in!

A typical safa tempo which is an electric minibus that seats 11

Sachita is the owner and driver of her safa tempo

Aeloi Technologies – token powered finance

Aeloi is a fintech social enterprise in Nepal. We are making micro-impact investments accountable and accessible for green microentrepreneurs using digital tokens. Digital tokens are a flexible form of shop credit only usable at pre-vetted vendors. Our SMS platform doesn’t require smart phones or mobile data and is specifically designed for first time digital financial services users. We digitally link impact investors, local microfinance institutions, entrepreneurs, and vendors in real time, ensuring each dollar of investment is used productively.

Investments with an impact focus – such as subsidized loans, social impact bonds, or carbon offsets – are usually not “user-friendly” for microenterprises in emerging markets. Stringent reporting requirements means layers of management and high administration costs, rendering small investments unfeasible. Therefore entrepreneurs in the grassroots green economy are left behind in the move towards a sustainable future, as indicated by the US$2 trillion credit gap for 65 million emerging market microenterprises.

A problem of trust between lenders and borrowers, we believe, is the fundamental reason for the continued lack of affordable financing at the grassroots level. Aeloi’s digital token platform helps increase trust between lenders, borrowers, impact investors, vendors, and other stakeholders.

For example, an impact investor invests US$1 million into a microfinance cooperative in Nepal as a fixed deposit. The deposit generally earns about 12% interest per annum at such microfinance institutions. Then, 4% is returned to the investor, 4% is used to subsidize loans for microentrepreneurs, and 4% is Aeloi’s operations fee. The subsidized loan is issued in digital tokens, therefore ensuring the investment is spent on business expenses. A transparent record is automatically generated in real-time.

Green Energy Mobility (GEM)

Initial online research showed us that the number of safa tempos had not increased since the mid-2000s. Curious about the reason, we started interviewing a lot of safa tempo drivers and owners to understand their challenges. We found out that actually there are an estimated 100 safa tempos just sitting and slowly rusting in garages. It was a sad sight to behold.

Some garages had many safa tempos that sat rusting because of a lack of financing to buy batteries

The reason behind this is that one of the main challenges for safa tempo owners and drivers is to upgrade their battery and engine technology. For example, the owners often buy a pair of lead acid batteries that last only 1 to 1.5 years. This costs about US$4500. Lithium ion batteries that last 5-8 years are available and the technology is quite mature, but they cost almost US$10,000, which is completely out of reach for most women employed in the informal sector. So if an owner cannot afford a new set of batteries, they tend to leave the safa tempo at a garage because it is not worth the loan amount and interest rates. The interest rates can go as high as 26% p.a., depending on if the borrower has any collateral or credit history. If the owners have to take credit from loan sharks, then the interest rates are unpredictable and can go as high as 120% p.a. Often, they can’t access any loan, even with very high interest rates.

We believe our technology platform can help safa tempo owners and drivers. We envision a way to directly connect impact investors and customers to safa tempo owners and drivers through digital tokens. Not only will we help them access more affordable loans, we’ll also be able to help with the savings and repayment process. In addition, we’ll be able to use these digital footprints to create alternative credit scores for access to future loans if they want to expand their business.

With all of this information brewing in our minds, we reached out to the Electric Vehicle Association of Nepal and a safa tempo union to learn more about potential for partnership. We also started doing more customer market research, seeking companies that wanted to provide daily commute support for their employees, events that wanted to provide pooled transportation options for their attendees after 8 pm, and gated communities that wanted to provide transportation options to their elderly and children. We are continuing our customer interviewing process to make sure we can discover and target specific segments that will become our early adopters.

We are also engaging microfinance institutions and banks to see who would be interested in piloting digital token loans for safa tempo owners and drivers. The loans will be small at first to help with daily operations costs, which provides us data to construct an alternative credit score to ultimately access a loan for lithium ion batteries.

As a startup, we are continuously iterating to make sure our product truly addresses our stakeholders’ pain points. The Greenpreneurs program has been tremendously helpful in helping us carve out time to look at each part of our business from a holistic point of view. We also iterated on our business model to make our value proposition for each stakeholder stronger. We will continue to use the knowledge and skills we learnt from Greenpreneurs to move forward with our pilots.

Our vision is for detailed behavioural data from thousands of microfinance products to feed into our big data platform. In fact, we launched our agriculture product pilot, named ReGrow, two months ago and we are receiving very encouraging data. We will be launching our GEM pilot in October this year.

We are actively seeking impact investors who are interested in our model for partnership. Please reach us at hello@aeloi.com.

The global impact investing market was US$502 billion in 2018. Join us in helping grassroots green entrepreneurs directly access such financing!

Biography

Tiffany Tong (CEO) and Sonika Manandhar (CTO) are co-founders of Aeloi Technologies. They bring a combined 20 years of experience in fintech, international development, and computer engineering. While working with the World Bank and the Microsoft Innovation Center, they both graduated from the Singularity University based in Silicon Valley. Passion for using exponential technologies to improve livelihoods fuels their partnership. Aeloi’s mentors include advisors and staff from the Greenpreneurs program, Civil Society Academy (Welthungerhilfe), the UN Capital Development Fund, and the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.

By GGGI
Sep 18 2019 (IPS-Partners)

Environment always becomes my first concern. Plastic wastes and deforestations are the major issues that I have involved with. The story behind the business concept occurred when I was running a small construction project to build a room in the apartment which I needed to buy plywood to build that room. At that time, I realized that the plywood is totally made from woodchips. I then got an idea of ply-plastic by crunching the plastic into pieces and transforming them to ply-plastic. 

Plastic consumption and waste are in the positive growth, especially in the developing countries. The amount of 300 million tons of plastic has been produced every year. There are 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic that has been produced, 6.3 billion metric tons has become plastic waste. In Cambodia, according to the ACRA Foundation, around 10 million plastic bags are used in Phnom Penh every day. Urban Cambodians use more than 2,000 plastic bags every year.

Besides, deforestation is also the tough issue harmfully affecting the climate change. The total world forest loss till date is 7.3 million hectares per year. Amazon forest is also under threat. On the other hand, we are dealing with the current production in Cambodia that lack of sustainable association which creates lot of negative impact to social and environment, using more than 900,000 cubic meters of forests and producing more than 100 million tons of CO2 emission in last 5 year.

To solve this problem, we design the leading quality of eco-friendly and sustainable product with affordable price while proving the social and environmental impact through developing new product using plastic waste- called ply-plastic.

Plaswood specializes in the design and manufacture of plastic plywood that uses plastic waste recycling into ply-plastic, normally made from wood chips. It can be used in any kind of activities as the substitute product in the construction industry. Focused primarily on environmental issues, the company sees that plastic waste keeps increasing and forests are being cut down. Our facility was designed and built to create a production setting that minimizes environmental variables. The company aims at:

• Using plastic waste in production to create ply-plastic product;
• Reducing the consumption of trees; and
• Providing longer product durability than the existing alternatives.

For the initial process of the business, the company’s strategic operation is to make strong corporation with local waste collecting company by selecting valuable plastic wastes. The manufacturing process will start by using hi-tech machine as its operation.

In 2018, Plaswood made a chance to participate in competition – Asean Virtual Business Plan Competition – which was organized by Australian government which took place at Thailand. Unfortunately, the project got 4th place among 82 teams, comprising 232 individuals from 6 countries.

In mid-2018, this project has been applied the competition in England under the Worldlabs organization. Unfortunately, it’s been awarded as the top 100 shortlist projects among the hundreds of high-quality candidates. In mid-2019, Plaswood have been brought to another competition, organized by Canadian organization, under the Greenpreneur program and the idea is selected among 200 applications.

Currently, we’re working with Greenpreneur program to develop product to the real market. We have been working on this business idea with this program for around 3 months by having the virtual training with the Canadian teams to write the business plan in this acceleration program.

We are also given the weekly tasks to complete and the mentor to help our team working on the idea which we aim to make this idea to the real market in Cambodia.

Greenprenuer has given more insight about social lean business plan while the impact modelling is the key point to make the business more realistic. Guest speakers are invited to share their experiences regarding their stories of successes and failures. It has been an amazing experience to have been working virtually with the program. We gratefully thank the organizing teams for hardworking and feedback to improve our project.

By GGGI
Sep 18 2019 (IPS-Partners)

Shiva, 38 years, staying in a pent-house facing the Bellandur lake paid a bomb for this view 10 years back. But in 2019, often he wakes up to snow-flaked froth and smog and even shockingly fire over the lake. It has become a regular sight for him to watch water tankers filling the underground sump. 

Wondering how the beautiful water rich city is approaching its doom’s day?

Water disequilibrium in Bangalore

The city of lakes, Bangalore, that once had 900 lakes has now reduced to 189 lakes, due to unplanned and irrational urbanisation. Indiscriminate disposal of untreated industrial effluents, small scale defunct sewage treatment plants, over drawing of underground water, illegal water pumping; has put lot of stress on potable water. This has resulted in expensive and scarcity of freshwater.

The silicon-valley of India is forecasted to urbanise from 8 million people today to 20.3 million in 2031. With the expansion of the city there will be an exponential increase in water demand by 30 % in within the next three years creating a shortage of 330 MLD by 2021.

Bangalore is sourced by Cauvery river, urban and rural borewells. The Bangalore Water Supply and Sewage Board (BWSSB), civil body in Bangalore supplies 356 Million Gallon per day through pipelines and 45 Million Gallons per day through water-tankers. The water supplied through tankers by government is sold at a fixed rate of INR 100/Kilo litre. Over and above this, there are private tankers catering to increasing water demand. There is no publicly reliable data on total water supplied by private tankers. The price of private tankers is unregulated and varies from INR 58 /Kilo Litre to INR 330/ Kilo Litre.

Let’s Close the loop

In Bangalore around 190 Million Gallon water per day is treated by centralised sewage treatment plants set up by civil body in Bangalore. Less than 30% wastewater water is used for aquafer and public landscapes. The remaining treated recycled water is discharged in rivers and lakes. However, this can be very well utilised for various other purposes to reduce freshwater intake. The non-consumptive across these sectors is more than 70% of the freshwater consumption which is predominantly sourced from ground water or private water tanker. So, what’s the solution to economically reduce our water footprint?

There are lot of options to conserve and judiciously use water – monitoring, conservation, reusing the treated wastewater, etc. Water management and monitoring are definite solutions but not long-term answers for rapid urbanisation. Using recycled water is a sustainable solution, which non-consummative purposes across different sectors; Industries, Residential, Commercial, etc.

In 2017, Bangalore Municipal Authority announced the mandatory installation of Sewage treatment plant in residential gated apartments with more than 50 flats. But this notification faced major pushback from Resident Welfare Associations (RWAs) due to high initial cost, regular maintenance cost, space constraint to install sewage treatment plant and existing infrastructures constrains. Facilities with sewage treatment plant, uses only 20% of the recycled water and remaining is flushed into underground discharge line.

Also, centralised wastewater sector is highly unorganised, and the excess treated wastewater is unscientifically discharge into freshwater bodies. Lack of an unplanned supply chain model leads to wastage of a precious resource. Recycled water is 60% cheaper than potable water. The 19 Million Gallon of water per day is treated to Grade III water (tertiary level) which government is willing to sell at INR 60/ Kilo Litre.

Rent-On-Recycle Water

This brings the opportunity for Rent-O-ReWa (RoR) to close the loop with a sustainable long-term solution. The solution intents to strengthen the water supply chain and reduce the freshwater demand. It is an online platform for recycled water trading. The platform would link the excess water suppliers with the buyers through:

• On demand availability of Recycled Water.
• Pre-booking services: This service will assure availability of desired quantity of water to a certain limit.
• Water Quality Test report: With every tanker of water, RoR will provide a water quality test report certifying the grade of water to ensure that the water quantity meets the desired quality.
• Hassle Free Payments:  Provide purchase orders, bills and receipts to organize expenditure for water consumption.

The platform gives multiple benefits to the buyers and sellers of recycle water:

• for sellers recycled water is a waste, and they can earn money,
• buyers can save up to 60% of money by using recycled water.

The platform will reduce 15 Million Gallon per day in our first third year, saving above INR 3 crores for Bangalore government and private users.

The idea of Rent-o-Rent was originated in April’19. The Greenpreneurs program is informative, captivating and well structured. The program is perfect for those who want to start a business, and even for anyone who wants to formulate an idea into a business plan. The mentorship and critical reviewing from Ryan Brown and Shantanu Gotmare helped us develop and improve our business plan. The skills that we gained through this workshop will help the team succeed in all aspects of our start up journey. GGGI have inspired us to be social innovators in our globalized society.

By GGGI
Sep 2 2019 (IPS-Partners)

One morning Namitha awoke to a frantic call, “He can’t breathe. When he inhales, his ribs ache”, said Panchi. Panchi was one of the young mothers of the community that she was volunteering with and is just one among the thousands who use polluted water from the Yamuna River for her daily needs. Her son never fully recovered just like many other villagers who have been struck with epidemics of bone deformities, fluoride poisoning and water-borne diseases due to the rising water pollution in India.

According to the United Nations World Water Development Report, up to 80 percent of the global wastewater flows back into the ecosystem without being treated or reused, contributing to a situation where around 1.8 billion people use a source of drinking water contaminated with faeces, putting them at risk of contracting cholera, dysentery, typhoid and polio, which in turn has severe impacts on their physical and learning abilities throughout their lives.

Bactowatt treats wastewater sustainably using microbes and reduces carbon dioxide emissions, quantity of sludge, cost and treatment time

An estimated 14% of the global population still lacks access to electricity. Energy from fossil fuels is the dominant contributor to global climate change accounting for around 60% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

Only 51 % of all treated water in Abu Dhabi is recycled while the rest is discharged into the environment of which 400,000 m3 is disposed into the South Mussafah Channel.

Wastewater is not treated before disposal since it entails high costs and energy.

BactoWatt was born out of necessity to alleviate the problems of world energy crisis, climate change, clean water and sanitation. Contrary to conventional treatment processes using various chemicals, Bactowatt treats wastewater sustainably using microbes and reduces carbon dioxide emissions, quantity of sludge, cost and treatment time. It also produces viable by-products like renewable energy and reusable grey water.

The technology is based on microbial fuel cells which is a device that converts biochemical energy to electrical energy by the action of microorganisms. The applications of BactoWatt range from wastewater treatment plants & manufacturing industries to low income communities, municipalities and non-profit organizations.

The core idea is to transform wastewater into a renewable resource that proves to be the need of the hour with the current rate of fossil fuel overuse.

As a start up, here for the long haul, we plan to advance in three phases; Phase 1 involves innovation partnerships to create the pilot prototype, Phase 2 involves the testing and development of the pilot prototype and Phase 3 involves production and launch of our commercial prototype.

Our team is a group of five young professionals who have varied backgrounds ranging from design and engineering to biotechnology. We share an immense passion for sustainability and BactoWatt is just our first step to giving back to the community and Planet Earth.

Being a part of the Greenpreneurs program has been one of the most enriching experiences into entrepreneurship for BactoWatt. Greenpreneurs and its wonderful team have put together an amazing program which will help pave the way for incredible sustainable ideas to take shape for generations to come.

To receive advice from subject matter experts, gain insight from our wonderful mentors and trainers, and get a chance to interact with our GGGI country representatives were once-in-a lifetime opportunities. We would like to thank Greenpreneurs for believing in us and giving us this incredible opportunity to participate in a global competition.

By GGGI
SEOUL, Aug 28 2019 (IPS-Partners)

The Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) welcomed the Government of Uganda (GoU) as its thirty-third Member, committing to support the country in achieving its Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) and implementing its National Adaptation Plan. GoU sought for GGGI’s membership in 2015 by signing a letter of intent to support the country in its effort to transition to a green economy as the vehicle for sustainable development.

The objective of accession for GGGI’s membership, to a developing country like Uganda, is to ensure that GGGI provides support in its transition to a green growth economic development model and help implement strategies that simultaneously achieve poverty reduction, social inclusion, environmental sustainability and economic growth, thereby promoting poverty reduction, jobs creation, and protecting the environment.

As the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development takes effect globally, the GoU has so far taken gradual steps to implement principles of green growth and align them to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In fact, GoU was among the first countries to mainstream SDGs into its (national) development plan. Uganda, therefore, adopted a climate-centric economic model through the development and launch of the Uganda Green Growth Development Strategy (UGGDS) and Roadmap. Currently, GGGI supports the GoU in the following sectors: Energy, Water and Environment, Urban Development, Green Cities and Natural Resources.

Furthermore, GGGI is supporting Uganda to access climate finance for the implementation of its national adaptation plan, for example by being the GoU’s delivery partner for the Green Climate Fund supporting the country to access funding from this source. GGGI’s support to Uganda is expected to deliver impacts on GGGI’s six Strategic Outcomes: Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions reduction as espoused in the Paris Agreement; creation of green jobs; increased access to sustainable services, such as, clean affordable energy, sustainable public transport, improved sanitation, and sustainable waste management; improved air quality; adequate supply of ecosystem services; and enhanced adaptation to climate change.

About GGGI

Based in Seoul, GGGI is a new intergovernmental organization founded to support and promote a new model of economic growth known as “green growth.” The organization partners with countries to help them build economies that grow strongly and are more efficient and sustainable in the use of natural resources, less carbon intensive, and more resilient to climate change. GGGI’s experts are already working with governments around the world, building their capacity and working collaboratively on green growth policies that can impact the lives of millions. To learn more, see www.gggi.org and visit us on Facebook and Twitter.

By GGGI
SEOUL, Republic of Korea, Aug 13 2019 (IPS-Partners)

(GGGI) – In June, the Global Green Growth Institute’s (GGGI) staff members and country offices around the world committed to living and promoting sustainable lifestyles. To further this initiative, GGGI published GREENISM Vol. 2, an online magazine featuring stories of GGGI’s Green Office Month events and activities across the organization to spread ideas on how to lead green lives.

GGGI’s Green Office Month is a campaign to promote sustainable living practices and office operations throughout the month of June. As this year’s World Environment Day theme was Beat Air Pollution, GGGI offices around the world contributed efforts towards living a green lifestyle, including hosting a gardening class at the Seoul HQ and by participating in an organization-wide competition titled the “GGGI June Eco-Challenge” to promote sustainable living practices. This volume of GREENISM also features GGGI stories from around the globe, GGGI’s Green Office, and ways to fight air pollution.

Many individual actions can make a difference in our communities. Therefore, a large part of the GGGI Eco-Challenge was to commit to making changes toward a sustainable lifestyle and to spread the word for others to join in to protect our planet. In Burkina Faso, participants encouraged each other to ride bikes or walk to reduce air pollution that would have been caused by taking cars. In Cambodia, GGGI staff members made individual pledges to commit to a sustainable lifestyle, such as using reusable bottles or composting.

It’s now more important than ever that we collaborate to preserve the planet, as air pollution is becoming a severe threat to our health and well-being. Exposure to outdoor and indoor air pollution is estimated to cause 7 million deaths per year according to the World Health Organization. It’s time for all of us to start lowering this amount and reducing air pollution levels to limits below the WHO’s guidelines, to improve both our environment and health.

Join us in the fight against air pollution and start making a difference today! To discover sustainable home and office ideas, read GGGI’s Greenism Vol. 2 here: http://online.anyflip.com/asvh/wdhw/mobile/index.html

Kigali, Rwanda’s capital, is the country’s largest city. However, the country hopes to soon implement the first stage of a new dynamic plan for the development of six climate-resilient secondary cities. Credit: Aimable Twahirwa/IPS

By Emmanuel Hitimana
KIGALI, Jul 15 2019 (IPS)

How do you plan a resilient city? A city that can withstand climate change impacts, and the natural disasters that it produces at increased frequencies. And how do you protect the city, its individuals and communities, its business and institutions from either the increased flooding or prolonged droughts that result? It’s a complex question with an even more complex solution, but one that the central African nation of Rwanda is looking to answer.

“Urban resilience means preventing disasters, and planning ahead in order to cope with them in an efficient way,” says Rwanda’s National Roadmap for Green Secondary Cities Development.

The roadmap, which was developed by the government with assistance from the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) in 2016, provides guidance for the development of six climate resilient secondary cities in the country. It also outlines how they can grow sustainably while also contributing to Rwanda’s national urbanisation strategy, which according to the roadmap is to “achieve 35 percent urbanisation by 2020 for each of the secondary cities”.

Environmentalists convened in Kigali to discuss the integration of green growth in Rwanda’s satellite cities. Credit: Emmanuel Hitimana/IPS

What is a green city?

Rwanda, along with its development partners, hopes to soon implement the first stage of the dynamic plan that will kick off in Nyagatare, a district that borders Uganda in the northeast. On Thursday, Jul. 11, environmentalists, private sector stakeholders and government officials convened for a workshop in Kigali to discuss the integration of green growth in Rwanda’s secondary cities. 

While large cities are often known for waste, pollution and bad urban planning, Nyagatare will be a far cry from this. Nyagatare will be a green city not only because of the lush, hilly landscape in which it sits, but because the city itself will be built along the lines of a green economy. It will be net zero carbon (by 2050), resource and waste efficient and have a green economy, which aims to offer high quality employment to its residents.

Also key is improved water efficiency—which includes installing water efficient plumbing fixtures, rainwater harvesting systems, wastewater treatment in buildings, and the reuse of treated wastewater for flushing and other secondary applications etc.—green public spaces, green transport modes and buildings constructed from eco-friendly products.

Nyagatare will be the first of six districts to be developed under the “Readiness and preparatory support to implement Green City Development Projects in Rwanda’s Secondary Cities”, which operationalises the national roadmap and which is being implemented by the government, and the Rwanda Environmental Management Authority (REMA) in partnership with GGGI.

The establishment of the secondary cities is a key part of Rwanda’s priority to tackling climate change. Rwanda was awarded 600,000 dollars by Green Climate Fund (GCF) for the project, which will not only protect the environment but will consolidate the land use in the six districts, according to Jean Pierre Munyeshyaka, the senior associate for Green Urbanisation at GGGI Rwanda.

“The chosen cities were part of districts that showed signs of development but they were not ready for green growth. That is why we did this project and submitted this project to GCF to help them build conscious-driven green development,” Munyeshyaka told IPS.

All districts have been strategically chosen because of their population size, geographic location and contribution to the country’s economy. The other districts are Muhanga, which is close to Kigali; Huye, which is considered the country’s knowledge centre and is home to the National University of Rwanda and the National Institute of Scientific Research; Musanze and Rubavu, which are tourist destinations and close to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Uganda respectively; and Rusizi district, which borders the southern DRC and is the location of one of the country’s three major lake ports.

Munyeshyaka explained that the secondary cities will be run on renewable energy and be built to ensure low carbon emissions. There will also be easy-to-use public roads and transport, easy access to markets and health centres. He explained that when more people spent less money to travel to hospitals or markets, it meant they could save more and use their money for other things, such as business development etc.

Rapid economic and urban growth

The hilly, fertile, and relatively non-resource rich nation of Rwanda has made great strides in economic growth over the last decade, its 8.6 percent growth in 2018 was listed as the highest on the continent, according to the World Bank.

But it is also one of the most densely-populated countries on the continent with almost 12.2 million people living in a nation the size of the U.S. state of Maryland. That’s approximately 445 people per square kilometre, according to Rwanda’s 4th Population and Housing Census Projection.

And while Rwanda has been called one of the “least urbanised” countries on the continent, with only 18 percent of its population living in cities, its urban population growth rate “is 4.5 percent, which is well above the world average of 1.8 percent”, according to the roadmap.

“Rwanda, although predominantly rural, has been urbanising rapidly, from a half-million urban residents in 1995 to more than three and a half million today,” according to Ilija Gubic, a senior urbanisation and infrastructure officer with GGGI in Rwanda and Dheeraj Arrabothu, a GGGI green building officer who helps the Rwanda Housing Authority (RHA) promote green urbanisation in Rwanda.

Faustin Munyazikwiye, the deputy Director General of Environment Management Authority, said all sustainable development projects in the country need to be considered with a green economy in mind. Credit: Emmanuel Hitimana/IPS

No growth without green growth

Faustin Munyazikwiye, the deputy Director General of REMA, the national designated authority mandated to facilitate coordination and oversight of the implementation of the national environmental policy and the subsequent legislation, said any sustainable development project in the country needs to think in terms of a green economy.

“We have seen and we are aware that our country is under immense risk when it comes to climate change. For that matter, we have identified six cities to start with readiness and preparation. We will equip them with necessary infrastructures that will resist any harm to climate change,” Munyazikwiye told IPS.

According to a USAID climate change risk profile on Rwanda “rising temperatures, more frequent and intense heavy rains, and potentially increased duration of dry spells threaten Rwandan agriculture”. Some 70 percent of Rwandans are employed in the agriculture sector, which accounts for 50 percent of the country’s export revenue.

Munyazikwiye was speaking during the Jul. 11 workshop on implementing green growth strategies of the Nyagatare master plan.

During the workshop, staff from various government and private entities were trained on how to include green growth and climate resilience in project concepts and taught how to engage with the GCF for climate finance and green investment opportunities in Rwanda.

Green growth success dependent on private sector partners

“Private sector is absolutely the key. At the end of the day there is limited public funds in the world. It is actually the private [sector] that has to step in to help reach climate change goals and [get] implementation process running, ” Inhee Chung, Rwanda Country Director for GGGI, told IPS.

She explained that aside from getting the private sector on board with the concept of a green economy and getting it to invest in eco-friendly products like building materials and other innovations that will be used during the development of the secondary green cities, GGGI have also been focusing on integrating the community to help them understand the shared vision.

“For us green growth does not just mean only the environment. It actually means growth with the people. Environment, people and economy, they are all interlinked because if one is excluded  sustainability isn’t really achieved, this is why we make every step inclusive,” she said.

Much of the area earmarked in Nyagatare district for the secondary city is inhabited by middle income families.

Parfait Karekezi, the Green and Smart Cities Specialist at the RHA, the agency responsible for urbanisation, whose mandate includes responsibility for settlements and building construction, who was also speaking during a panel discussion at the workshop, was asked if the national roadmap and the master plan established the required enabling environment for green growth.

“RHA  is a championing entity in urban and housing development, its role in the process is to synergise and bring together different stakeholders and create a more coordinated and consolidated framework. Therefore, through the National Advisory Committee, effective strategies and ideas are discussed, reviewed and delivered,” he said, adding that the RHA also plays a key role in engaging local stakeholders and communities in the process.

Sally Murray, a country economist at the International Growth Centre, is optimistic about the future of Rwanda’s urbanisation.

“Rwanda has an opportunity that may be unique in Africa – to harness urbanisation to its full potential,” Murray states in a paper on urbanisation and economic growth in the country.

And it seems that Rwanda is on its way to doing just that.

By GGGI
Jun 12 2019 (IPS-Partners)

SEOUL, Republic of Korea  (GGGI) – Out of more than 200 participants, 15 were shortlisted from GGGI’s Member countries and countries where GGGI has operations, including Cambodia, Colombia, Ethiopia, India, Jordan, Morocco, Nepal, the Philippines, Rwanda, Uganda, the UAE, and Vanuatu. This year, GGGI is pleased to have a variety of project ideas designed to facilitate the achievement of green growth and climate change action in developing countries, including innovative uses of solar PV systems, recycling solutions, and waste management innovations.

In 2019, 50% of applications consisted of teams with female leads with regional diversity of 43% (Asia), 7% (Small islands), 30% (Sub-Saharan Africa), 17% (MENA), and 3% (Latin America).

GGGI would like to congratulate the following 15 participants who will take part in a 12-week support and development program, receiving mentoring and training through a virtual webinar. The top three teams who win the Business Plan Competition will win USD 5,000 per team in seed funding to invest in their business ideas plus bursaries.

In April, GGGI kicked off a global competition to support young entrepreneurs develop sustainable ideas or solutions that would positively impact their communities and the Sustainable Development Goals.

“We are hoping to foster a generation of young leaders passionate about promoting green solutions and a sustainable future"

Dr. Frank Rijsberman, Director-General of GGGI

Now in its second year, the Greenpreneurs 2019 program aims to serve as a platform for young entrepreneurs with ideas for business development, that is environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive.

“Young entrepreneurs have innovative business ideas to accelerate the transition to green growth in developing countries, however, they still lack access to right technical training, network, mentorship, and seed capital. Thus, together with Student Energy and the Youth Climate Lab, GGGI launched a pilot Greenpreneurs program in 2018 with the aim of providing support for green growth startups, particularly in developing countries.”

Believing in the potential of the youth, Greenpreneurs is designed to provide opportunities for young entrepreneurs to transform innovative ideas into green businesses in sustainable energy, water and sanitation, sustainable landscapes and green cities – all of which are GGGI’s thematic priorities.

“We are hoping to foster a generation of young leaders passionate about promoting green solutions and a sustainable future. Last year, we launched a business competition limited to virtual mentoring over the web, but this year, we are envisioning to have physical incubators to join the green streams to nurture green entrepreneurs,” said Dr. Frank Rijsberman.

GGGI’s partner, the Youth Climate Lab, shared how “youth play a crucial role in combating climate change. Their active participation provides intergenerational viewpoints of present and future citizens, which are fundamental to sustainable development.”

About Greenprenuers Program 2019

Greenpreneurs is a twelve-week virtual global competition open to youth between the ages of 17 and 35 focused in GGGI’s Member countries. The four priority themes (Sustainable Energy, Water & Sanitation, Sustainable Landscapes, and Green Cities) reflect the urgent issues impeding growth in developing countries in the context of green growth, climate change, and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Credit: Frank Rijsberman.

By Frank Rijsberman
SEOUL, May 8 2019 (IPS-Partners)

(GGGI) – On October 1, 2016, I officially began my four-year term as Director-General of the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI). Together with GGGI’s Members, Management Team and staff, I started an exciting journey, implementing the Work Program and Budget (WPB) 2017-18 approved by the Council, while at the same time building and redesigning GGGI’s business models.

The past two-and-a-half years have seen change in the organization’s business processes, which include shifting focus to country offices from the Seoul headquarters; moving toward putting more emphasis on results – focusing on GGGI’s 6 Strategic Outcomes in its Refreshed Strategic Plan 2015-2020 as well as its business plans, projects, corporate results frameworks and impact assessment work; and bringing flexibility and adaptability in its project cycle.

In a world where I believe the aid industry will be disrupted, and many other disruptions will affect our Members, providing both threats and opportunities is key. Will our Members be leaders? Or will they be followers? Will they leapfrog, or see an ever-widening gap? Will they be disruptors or be disrupted.

Now, we are in the midst of developing a strategy for the next 10 years, known as GGGI’s Strategy 2030. To drive the formulation of the Strategy 2030, we are in the process of examining thematic areas, value creation models and outlining broad goals that are aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Agreement. GGGI recently held its Ninth Meeting of the Management and Program Sub-Committee (MPSC) at the Institute’s Seoul headquarters where our Members were given an opportunity to actively engage in and contribute to the organization’s strategy development process.

Midway through my tenure, I realize now is an ideal time to reflect upon my experience, look at where the organization stands and examine what is happening in the world around us.

I am always optimistic, but impatient optimism is also the mantra of Bill and Melinda Gates that I share completely. This phrase refers to optimism that development actually works and has brought huge progress to billions of people, despite the nay-sayers and that we need to be impatient given the urgency of the challenges we face. Whether you take your inspiration from the IPCC 1.5 degree report, or the environmental events such as the 2018 forest fires and droughts, or the air pollution crisis in Seoul – there are plenty of goods reasons to be impatient to see progress at scale, and be optimistic that we can make it happen. That is why I am proud to be an impatient optimist!

In 2007 in Silicon Valley, Apple launched the first iPhone, and Google and its colleagues were busy disrupting many industries. None of us book our travel and hotels like we used to or find restaurants like we used to. I haven’t visited my main bank in France in years, as I do all my business with them online. Amazon is worth more than the next five biggest retailers put together. And we are in the middle of witnessing the renewable energy disruption and are on the cusp of the e-mobility disruption.

In his brand new book “ The Business of Changing the World”, Raj Kumar, editor in Chief of Devex, argues that we are also in the middle of a disruption of the aid industry – and I find that he puts very eloquently what have become my convictions as well during my period among the disruptors when I worked in Silicon Valley for Google.org and the Gates Foundation.

Raj Kumar argues that Old Aid is about:

• Good intentions – focusing on how much money was spent.
• The giver, the donor – with the other side referred to as the “beneficiary”.
• Monopolies of the UN, the World Bank and some big donors like USAID and DFID (or “monopsonies” to be more).
• Following the rules, rather than focusing on the results.

In contrast, New Aid is:

• All about the results, first and foremost, and evidence-driven and based on data.
• About the customers rather than the beneficiaries.
• About many more new players – foundations, social entrepreneurs, start-ups, and even the mainstream private sector discovering the true triple bottom line.
• But above all is about the results, delivering impact and being accountable, not covering our backs by having followed the rules.

Why does any of this matter for GGGI? In a world where I believe the aid industry will be disrupted, and many other disruptions will affect our Members, providing both threats and opportunities is key. Will our Members be leaders? Or will they be followers? Will they leapfrog, or see an ever-widening gap? Will they be disruptors or be disrupted.

History shows that the incumbents rarely manage to be the disruptors. AT&T would not believe that mobile phones would rapidly eat their landline business. The UN and the World Bank have been engaged in near-continuous reforms for decades now, but I don’t see them taking a lead.

In fact, all during my career I have encountered the pessimists that claim that new technologies will not be relevant for developing countries for a long time. That was the case in the early 1980s when I advocated for the use of personal computers in water resources management. Or later that decade when I wanted to distribute DVDs instead of books. Or more recently, in 2008-9 when few people believed that smart phones would be relevant for poor people in developing countries.

Credit: Frank Rijsberman.

Yet, traveling for GGGI in 2017, going “off the grid” in Myanmar, poor people’s rural houses often had small solar panels outside, lighting one or two bulbs inside, and allowing people to watch movies on DVD players. Non-Governmental Organizations brought those solar home kits to the most remote villages. In Kiribati last year, the most remote GGGI presence I have visited, I was in a phone shop where they sold low-end smart phones for about $10. And big billboards outside advertised mobile banking – for people who never had a bank account, no credit rating, enabling them to send money to family in outer islands over their phones. Most people could not have imagined this 10 years ago – and yet we are planning for the next 10 years, where changes will, if anything, most likely be at a faster pace.

Credit: Frank Rijsberman.

What is our route and what is our destination? Will we be disruptors or be disrupted in the world of New Aid? I think the jury is still out – both are still possible – but I think we have worked hard to increase the odds that we can be disruptors, if that is the path we choose. I, for one, would love to be a disruptor, but it may well be a bumpy ride – fasten your seat belts!

My sense is that GGGI will have a chance to help its Member countries to transition their economies to a low-carbon future, contribute to solving dramatic global climate change, increase the blue skies and healthy landscapes, and provide decent green jobs for people to work in. These are what gets me up, and excited to come to work, in the morning.

Excerpt:

(GGGI) – The Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) today announced the appointment of Susanne Pedersen as Assistant Director-General and Head of GGGI’s Investment and Policy Solutions Division (IPSD). Ms. Pedersen will be based in the organization’s Seoul headquarters and will assume her duties on June 3, 2019.

As Head of IPSD, Ms. Pedersen’s responsibilities will include strategic planning, implementation and delivery of GGGI’s projects and programs in Member and partner countries and the work of IPSD’s Thought Leadership, Green Investment Services, and 4 Thematic sector teams.

Susanne Pedersen

Serving as a member of the Management Team, Ms. Pedersen will play a key role in fostering an organizational culture that delivers strong performance and impactful outcomes.

“I see great potential in GGGI to deliver impact and make a difference in its Member and partner countries.” said Ms. Pedersen. “Throughout much of my career, I have supported emerging and developing economies in their transition to a low-carbon and sustainable future and am therefore extremely excited to help drive GGGI’s inclusive, environmentally sustainable, green growth agenda.”

A Danish national, Ms. Pedersen is currently the Managing Director at Climate-KIC Nordic Aps, where she is responsible for leading work within the Nordic Region under the Climate-Knowledge Innovation Community (KIC), which is Europe’s largest public-private partnership with more than 350 members addressing climate change through innovation.

“Sustainability and green growth have been an integral part of my focus areas and I look forward to contributing to GGGI’s thematic areas by leveraging my professional experience in urban transitions, technology development and innovation,” added Ms. Pedersen.

From setting up international daughter companies and establishing new service areas, to managing large-scale teams and projects, Ms. Pedersen brings a wealth of experience to GGGI.

“We are very excited to bring Ms. Pedersen on board and benefit from her more than two decades of work with international organizations, industry associations and the private sector as a manager, board member and strategic advisor,” said Dr. Frank Rijsberman, Director-General of GGGI.

About the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI)

Based in Seoul, GGGI is an intergovernmental organization that supports developing country governments transition to a model of economic growth that is environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive. GGGI delivers programs in over 30 countries with technical support, capacity building, policy planning & implementation, and by helping to build a pipeline of bankable green investment projects. More on GGGI’s events, projects and publications can be found on www.gggi.org. You can also follow GGGI on Twitter and join on Facebook, YouTube and LinkedIn.

(GGGI Seoul HQ)
HeeKyung Son, Communications Specialist
+82 70-7117-9957
H.Son@GGGI.org

(GGGI Seoul HQ)
Daniel Muñoz-Smith, OIC Head of Communications
+82 70-7117-9961
Daniel.MS@GGGI.org

The work culture in South Korea is different and managers here often say that they are used to the rigid hierarchy at work.

By Ahn Mi Young
SEOUL, Jan 21 2019 (IPS)

Despite the international rise of South Korean businesses like Samsung, Hyundai and LG as global powerhouses, the corporate culture in this East Asian nation is often known to have a vertically rigid command line.

“When you have a good idea, you’d rather wait until you earn trust from your boss,” says Kim Chull-Soo, 42, who works at a Seoul-based finance business. “Trying to stand out in a crowd by explicitly speaking is not a good idea in Korean corporate culture,” Kim adds.

Diverse and global organisation that goes against the grain

But the Seoul-based Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) has been initiating a corporate culture that is very different from this mainstream. From encouraging staff to be transformational without being afraid of sticking out, to having open plan offices which go against the traditional hierarchical structure of having individual offices, this international organisation is pushing boundaries as its fulfils its mandate to achieve resilient, sustainable growth.

“We are building a united cultural front to strengthen our core values to be bold, excellent, inclusive and act with integrity,” Christel Adamou, head of human resources, tells IPS from GGGI’s head office. She adds that the organisational culture here is unique because it “is younger, more dynamic”.

GGGI, an inter-governmental organisation committed to developing green economies through supporting its 30 member states, lists over 60 operational projects in all member countries. This includes projects that involve the development of: green cities, water and sanitation projects, sustainable landscapes, sustainable energy projects and cross-cutting strategies for financing mechanisms.

GGGI has around 300 employees. And among international organisations, GGGI is one of the smallest so it has had to expand its capacity to meet its global mission. “We at GGGI need a much greater capacity to help member states in their transition to sustainable development and also adapt to climate changes,” Ban Ki-Moon, former Secretary-General of the United Nations the new president and chair of GGGI, said in 2018.

Hierarchical structure is the norm in most South Korean businesses

The work culture in South Korea is different. And managers at most South Korean firms often say that they are used to the rigid hierarchy at work. Creating and implementing new ideas is usually made by the boss of the organisation, explains Park Jae-Min, 43, who works at a Seoul-based business group.

“When we start something new, we are trying to listen and find out what our boss wants before we talk,” Park says.

Lee Jong-Min, 38, who works for a Korean-British joint venture business in Seoul, agrees. “Oddly, I usually feel comfortable with my Korean boss who makes a quick decision by himself and commands me to [implement it]. I sometimes feel embarrassed when my British boss asks my opinion before he makes an opinion.”

Practicing core values

But if core values tend to be hierarchal in South Korean businesses, at GGGI head office the values of inclusivity, boldness and transformation are clearly visible.

Adamou describes the organisation’s essence quite clearly from her first impression. “When I first came here in 2017, I felt the air of  dynamism and enthusiasm in GGGI here I didn’t find before in bigger organisations.” She joined GGGI after her stint as chief human resources officer for the United Nations peace-keeping mission in Haiti and as legal advisor to the U.N. Dispute Tribunal in Nairobi. She also worked at other U.N. organisations and has been based in Switzerland, Liberia and at the U.N.’s New York headquarters.

In South Korea, your job title also usually determines where you sit at work.

But GGGI’s office space itself has an air of interaction and youth. In the open plan office, there is a lively and communicative air among the staff who are mostly in their 30s or 40s. At the office centre there is an open plaza where people relax over coffee, talk and brainstorm.

“So there is a circle of staff, brainstorming, thinking together, designing the framework, how we would like to frame our values at GGGI. Decisions would usually be made top down, but for the culture-building initiatives, most was made in a bottom up way. [This way], there was more ownership, and of course the result was always better when you involve as many stake holders as possible,” Adamou explains.

Holding on to some South Korean practices

Meanwhile GGGI embraces the South Korean business culture of being competitive with integrity.

Acting with integrity is essential for GGGI to communicate as a neutral, trusty partner, explains Adamou, “because the in-country projects are embedded into diverse entities like government, finance, environment and health”.

Being based in-country also means that GGGI aids its staff in developing geographical mobility by increasing their exposure to internationally diverse settings. This, Adamou says, also fosters neutrality in the organisation’s work.

“A head programmer in Seoul may become a country representative in Cambodia. Or an analyst in Ethiopia may be programming in Columbia. Otherwise, if you stay too long in one location, it may develop too much of a relationship with one government and it can hinder [their mission] to be neutral. We work for GGGI not for personal relationships [with a particular entity],” Adamou adds.

January 2018 alone saw temperatures drop to -50 degrees Celsius. This has had vast impacts on Mongolia’s herders. Credit: Michelle Tolson/IPS

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage and IPS Correspondent
UNITED NATIONS, Jan 15 2019 (IPS)

The landlocked country of Mongolia sparks certain images in the mind—rolling hills with horses against a picturesque backdrop.

However, the East Asian country is facing a threat that will change its landscape: climate change.

“Climate change isn’t affecting everyone around the world evenly. Small island states is an example and another example is people who live in more norther climates like Mongolia,” United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and the Environment John Knox told IPS.

“The problem for Mongolia is, with respect to climate change, is that it contributes almost nothing to greenhouse gasses…so that means instead Mongolia has to be concerned with adaptation,” he added.

According to the Mongolian Ministry of Environment, the mean air temperature increase by more than 2 degrees Celsius between 1940 and 2014, more than twice the global average.

This has increased the frequency of natural disasters such as what is locally known as “dzud”—a summer drought followed by a severe winter, a phenomenon that has increased over recent years.

January 2018 alone saw temperatures drop to -50 degrees Celsius.

This has had vast impacts on the country’s herders.

Almost 50 percent of the Mongolia’s 3 million population are employed in animal husbandry. They produce 35 percent of agricultural gross production and account for 30 percent of the country’s export.

At the same time, 28 percent of the population live at or below the poverty line, making them dependent on this trade.

Almost 50 percent of the Mongolia’s 3 million population are employed in animal husbandry. They produce 35 percent of agricultural gross production and account for 30 percent of the country’s export. Credit: Michelle Tolson/IPS

“Any adverse impact of a changing climate on pasture availability would threaten forage yield, livestock productivity, and, ultimately, local and national food production capacity. Hence, environment and climate condition play a key role in the sustainable development of the country,” said Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI)’s Mongolia representative Romain Brillie.

Approximately 70 percent of grassland in the country is impacted by desertification while the area of barren land expanded 3 times between 1992 and 2006.

While overgrazing has contributed to the changes in the environment, climate change has exacerbated the impacts.

Without sustainable livelihoods, many have poured into the country’s cities including Ulaanbaatar where they live in informal settlements without basic facilities such as running water or sanitation.

And to cope with the long and harsh winters, families use coal-fired stoves, contributing to air pollution.

In fact, Ulaanbaatar has one of the highest rates of air pollution in the world, increasing the risk of acute and chronic respiratory issues.

According to U.N.’s Children Agency (UNICEF), the three diseases that have resulted in the most lost life-years in the East Asian countries are related to air pollution.

But steps are being taken to mitigate the crisis, Brillie noted.

“Mongolia has been very active in establishing a conducive policy environment for climate change mitigation and adaptation…for instance, Mongolia is one of the countries that has been the most successful in accessing the Green Climate Fund,” he told IPS.

In 2017, the government adopted a new law which aims to increase the country’s share of renewable energy in total primary energy sources to 25 percent by 2025, and 30 percent by 2030.

Mongolia has already started investing in wind power, establishing its first wind farm in 2013.

GGGI has also been working with the government to support its green development targets in energy and green finance.

In 2018, GGGI helped secure 10 million dollars from the Government of Mongolia and Mongolian commercial banks to invest into the Mongolia Green Finance Corporation, a vehicle to leverage investments by the financial sector.

Knox highlighted the importance of such civil society in efforts towards climate change mitigation and adaptation.

“I think it’s at the individual and community level that we really see sustainable development take hold,” he said.

Brillie also pointed to the much needed role of the private sector, stating: “Financing Mongolia’s NDC’s alone would require 6,9 billion dollars and public investment alone cannot match the extent of the challenge…policy, regulatory and financial incentives and guarantees need to come together to help private companies invest into green projects.”

While there are now standards in place, Knox noted the need to implement and enforce them including in efforts to cut back on coal energy.

Currently, only seven precent of Mongolia’s energy production is renewable energy, and they will have to ramp up action if they are to reach their 2030 target.

And the Paris Agreement should be the light forward.

“In many ways, the threat of climate change in Mongolia can only be addressed by collective action by the major emitters of the world…The parties to the Paris Agreement need to surmount up their commitments as quickly as possible and they need to take more effective actions to implement the commitments they have already undertaken,” Knox told IPS.

Brillie spotlighted the role youth can and will play in the country’s sustainable, green future as GGGI works with Mongolia’s Ministry of Environment to promote green education.

“Young people are already driving change across the world. We must provide the skills to create new and green lifestyle,” he said.

Excerpt:

Communities in rural Papua New Guinea install their own cost effective and energy efficient solar panels. GGGI says that governments should rather invest in renewable energy. Credit: Catherine Wilson/IPS

By Yazeed Kamaldien
CAPE TOWN, South Africa, Jan 11 2019 (IPS)

While growth in the green economy looks promising, government regulation and a business-as-usual approach are among the hurdles inhibiting cleaner energy production.

Dr. Frank Rijsberman, director-general of the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), believes shifts are needed to realise more projects. And he believes funding is available.

“We have teams in more than 30 countries. We work on policy barriers and help develop bankable projects. In the last two years we have helped our member countries mobilise at least one billion dollars in green and climate finance,” Rijsberman told IPS. GGGI is a treaty-based international organisation that assists countries develop a green growth model.

Rijsberman was among panelists discussing ‘Unlocking Finance for Sustainability’ at the Partnership for Action on Green Economy (PAGE) Ministerial Conference being held in Cape Town, South Africa from Jan. 10 to 11. It gathered government leaders, businesses and environmentalists to focus on the challenge to “reduce inequalities, protect the environment and grow the economy”.

The conference focused on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted three years ago.

“It is time now to take these global goals and turn them into real changes in the lives of people and nations. It’s time for action,” stated the conference agenda.

“We can restructure our economic and financial systems to transform them into drivers of sustainability and social inclusion; the two prerequisites for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals and targets of the Paris Agreement on climate change,” it continued.

At the December United Nations’ Climate Conference in Katowice, Poland, where ministers from around the world negotiated on how best to implement the 2015 Paris Agreement, which outlines commitments to mitigate climate change, accessing finance was a topical issue. IPS reported from the 24th Conference Of The Parties (COP24) that the African team of negotiators had been concerned about who would carry the burden of financing the implementation of the Paris Agreement.

PAGE gathered around 500 innovators and leaders from governments, civil society, private sector, development organisations, media and the general public. The idea was to showcase “the experiences and creativity of first-movers…and engage in an open debate about what it is going to take to for us to have a ‘just transition’ to economics and societies that are more inclusive, stable and sustainable.”

Rijsberman offered his insights gained from working in different countries on accessing financing for green projects.

Excerpts of the interview follow:

Dr. Frank Rijsberman, director-general of the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), says the largest amounts of money available is with the private sector and institutional development such as pension funds. This, he says, can be accessed for climate change mitigation. Credit: Yazeed Kamaldien/IPS

Inter Press Service (IPS): Where is this money that you mention for green projects?

Frank Rijsberman (FR): There’s a lot more finance available than people think. There tends to be an over focus on development money but the largest amounts of money is with the private sector and institutional development such as pension funds. We need to get the private sector off the sidelines and to invest in renewable energy.

IPS: And how can that be done?

FR: They need to realise that green investments are attractive. If you want to do socially important projects then renewable energy is it. It has become the cheapest, most attractive form of energy.

IPS: What about the role that governments play in this? They are the regulators that sometimes inhibit the private sector.

FR: Sometimes we sit in the room with the private sector and ask them what stops them from investing and they say it’s regulation and policies. We have to find a more welcoming environment.

We talk to governments and they talk about a study they did three years ago and tell us renewable energy is expensive. But we tell them prices have come down. All that governments know is how to build fossil fuel power plants. Fossil fuel project developers are still in their contact lists. The banks know what to do. They need to look at an energy mix.

The Hopefield wind farm in the Western Cape, located 125km north of central Cape Town on the R45 highway, generates approximately 176 600 MWh of clean renewable energy every year. Its 37 wind turbines generate enough electricity to power about 70,000 low-income homes, or 29,000 medium-income homes. Construction on the project began in late 2012. Umoya Energy, a project supported by the South African department of energy, runs the wind farm. Credit: Yazeed Kamaldien/IPS

IPS: So what is it about government policies that hinder moves to renewable energy?

FR: Some governments have laws that they use to disconnect companies from power if they put solar on their rooftops. Other countries, like Finland, still have old polices that are bad and that are still on the books. It is also difficult politically when the government subsidises fuel and not renewable energy. Governments need to remove policy barriers.

We are in the middle of such a rapid transition but if you sit in a country where governments don’t see that it’s difficult.

Coal and oil is more certain [to produce power] but for countries that need to import that, where prices are uncertain, it’s a lot more certain to use the sun and wind if you have this in your country.

IPS: How is the prospect for renewable energy looking in the developing world?

FR: If you are using only coal-fired power plants then you will sit with a stranded asset. Countries that already have a lot of investment in fossil fuels will find the change to renewable energy painful.

In Africa, most countries don’t have this. In some countries only 20 percent of people have energy access. These countries can invest in green energy and they can avoid making bad investments and can leapfrog into renewables.

They don’t have to look like Asia where they have rapidly developed economies and sit with coal-fired power stations that pollute their cities.

There is a real opportunity to avoid the problems that other countries have.

IPS: What about developing country examples of renewable energy that worked?

FR: Just two years ago when the Indian government wanted to a build a power plant they found the prices of large-scale solar panels less than coal-fired power plants. They scrapped all their plans. They are looking at solar power projects.

But there is still a lot of inertia. People are still continuing to invest in fossil fuels. We are trying to show governments through information and projects that this is feasible. We want to show how it can reduce risk.

We are working on projects. In Fiji the government gives a subsidy to low-income houses for electricity. We have proposed a project where the government puts solar panels on the roof and uses the same subsidy to finance this. It’s about using that money for sustainability.

Low-income houses have TVs and mobile phones. Making a package for people that puts solar on their roof is better. They can charge their mobile phones and [solar] also connects to their fridge and TV. Social movements have done this in some countries.

Excerpt:

GGGIs Principle Investment Officer Tero Raassina presenting on rice husk energy opportunities.

By GGGI
Ayeyarwady Delta, Myanmar, Jan 4 2019 (GGGI)

In November 2018, a team of GGGI investment and bio-economy specialists have been travelling around the Ayeyarwady Delta and meeting members from national and regional government, NGOs, farming associations, businesses and communities to scope potential bio-economy commodities and investments that will enable socially inclusive green growth, and support national goals of climate change mitigation and adaptation in coastal areas.

In a series of workshops and site visits, GGGI facilitated discussions on the range of current value chain activities in the region to assess what key stakeholders see as the barriers to developing or scaling up these activities. One such value chain that was consistently identified was the bi-products of rice grain processing.

Participants from regional government, rice mills and NGOs discuss the barriers to expanding rice husk bio-economies.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Myanmar produced over 25 million metric tonnes of rice in 2016, of which the Delta region harvests almost half of. There are hundreds of small to medium sized rice mills in the region. Consultation participants described that during the harvesting and milling process, a considerable volume of less valuable bi-products are produced. These include the rice bran, rice straw which is often burnt, and rice husk which is often dumped directly (illegally) in waterways, causing widespread impacts to river and drinking water quality, and navigational safety.

Alternatively, there are a number of existing rice husk bio-gasification plants that use outdated technologies resulting in heavily polluted waterways. Similarly, there are existing rice husk fuel pellet facilities but participants frequently said these plants emit a foul smell.

Visualisation of rice bi-products

Initial value chain analysis shows these low-value bi-products can be used to make higher value products that can increase the income of rice farmers and millers and provide affordable energy to the wider region. The Delta has a low level of electrification at approximately 10% and suffers from chronic power shortages. This power shortage not only limits business development but also contributes to widespread deforestation of the mangroves for fuel wood. The government’s General Administration Department stated “rice husk to energy should be the first priority. If we can use this waste then everyone will benefit”.

The potential economic, social and environmental benefits of this value chain are timely for the Delta, with high proportions of landless rural households and reportedly the highest rates of mangrove deforestation in Asia. The potential investments in this value chain could significantly contribute to achievement of Myanmar’s Nationally Determined Contribution greenhouse gas mitigation targets and REDD+, climate change adaptation (including the NAPA), the Agricultural Development Strategy, and Myanmar’s Sustainable Development Plan.

Potential outcomes of rice husk energy for climate change.

GGGI visited an existing rice husk bio-gasification plant in the Delta and the operators discussed barriers to its development such as high startup costs and lack of affordable finance with up to 13% loan interest being reported. The financing shortfalls also limits access to modern clean technologies that are causing other environmental impacts.

GGGIs Myanmar Programme Officer Thiha Aung discuss issues at the Kyaiklat rice husk power plant.

This early analysis will feed into further in-depth value chain assessment by GGGI to design tailored financing solutions and social interventions that are pro-poor and lead to socially inclusive improvements.

Left: Traditional three-brick. Centre: Original design of the cookstove. Right: The fuel efficient cookstove.

By GGGI
Ayeyarwady Delta, Myanmar, Jan 4 2019 (GGGI)

In November 2018, a team of GGGI social development, and green investment specialists have been talking to representatives from national and regional government, NGOs, cookstove manufacturers and households from rural communities on how to increase the distribution and usage of fuel efficient cookstoves.

Fuel efficient cookstoves, or ‘improved’ cookstoves, have clear benefits over the traditionally used open three-brick method and even the original design of the cookstove. Most notably, the improved design is more fuel efficient and requires less fire wood to be collected, resulting in reduced deforestation and time-saving for households, particularly for women.

Although cookstoves are used in rural communities throughout Myanmar, their usage in the Delta is more problematic due to the rate of deforestation of mangrove forests for firewood. Mangroves are a critical forest type for climate change mitigation as they store up to 4 times the amount of carbon as other forest types. The mangrove forests of the Delta are also critical for disaster risk reduction during severe weather events and are foundation for sustaining coastal fishery-based livelihoods.

Potential outcomes of fuel efficient cookstoves for climate change.

In a series of workshops and site visits around the Delta, GGGI facilitated discussions as to why distribution and usage of fuel efficient cookstoves remains low. Cookstove manufacturers discussed barriers to their production, including costs and difficulties with attaining and transporting raw materials, a lack of access to start-up finances, labour-intensive manufacturing process, and a lack of marketing and promotion of product. Numerous problems were consistently mentioned by buyers, including inconvenient design, unfamiliarity with product benefits, remote communities lack access to distributers, and that fuel efficient cookstove is often more expensive than the original cookstove design.

The time required for drying cookstoves during manufacture is problematic, especially during monsoon season. Taken at a cookstove manufacturer in Kalarkon, near Pathein.

Figure 2 Cookstove manufacturing is time and people intensive, taking up to 15 days to produce the final product. Taken at a cookstove manufacturer in Kalarkon, near Pathein.

GGGI presented initial ideas for providing novel investment solutions to increase distribution and usage of fuel efficient cookstoves across the Delta. These have included linking the proven carbon savings of the fuel efficient cookstove to distributed ledger or ‘blockchain’ technology to access carbon credits from the international carbon market. This technology could connect the carbon emission savings of the cookstove to the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation, or CORSIA, to a domestic custodian bank, and various partners for manufacturing, certification, distribution and implementation. These credits can then be used to increase job opportunities, provide funding for increased distribution and subsidise the product price.

GGGIs Analyst Diana Quezada presents on financing solutions for improved cookstoves. With Principle Investment Officer Tero Raassina and Myanmar’s Programme Officer Thiha Aung.

The potential economic, social and environmental benefits of this investment solution are important for the Delta, with high rural population density and reportedly the highest rates of mangrove deforestation in Asia. The potential outcomes of this solution are aligned with Myanmar’s polices and strategies for climate change mitigation, adaptation, reforestation and sustainable development. It has potential for notable benefits for women by creating many decent, year-round employment opportunities during manufacture, by reducing the time being spent on firewood collection, and reducing respiratory ailments due to smoke inhalation. This benefit of time savings may also allow increased opportunities for girls to engage in educational activities and for women to focus on developing additional income streams.

Ingvild Solvang, GGGIs Global Leader on Gender and Social Development added “access to improved cookstoves is a global challenge, which if solved has the potential to reduce communities’ reliance on fuel wood. Improved cookstoves have positive impacts on deforestation, but also communities spend much time and resources on fuel collection, which contributes to time-poverty particularly for women and girls. Improved cookstoves have a can improve indoor pollution, which causes health problems for children, vulnerable and elderly family members, and those mainly in charge of cooking, typically women.”

Integrated fish ponds and forestry at a LIFT-funded climate smart agriculture project, Bogale.

By GGGI
Ayeyarwady Delta, Myanmar, Jan 4 2019 (GGGI)

In November 2018, GGGI have been exploring potential investments in agriculture, forestry and fishery value chains that not only increase economic and social development, but also reduce deforestation pressures and increase the extent of mangrove forests. GGGI investment, forestry policy and bio-economy specialists have been consulting with communities, NGOs and government in the Ayeyarwady Delta to understand the factors that are critical to achieve fully inclusive, sustainable success, and support national goals of climate change mitigation and adaptation in coastal areas.

The conservation of mangrove forests is a notable policy priority for Myanmar. Mangroves are widely acknowledged to offer life-saving protection to coastal communities against the impact of extreme weather events, storm surges and tropical cyclones. In addition their contribution to climate change adaptation, mangrove forests store up to 400% more carbon than other forest types (particularly in their soils) which makes their conservation important to maintaining the stability of global climate. Unfortunately, Myanmar’s mangrove forests are disappearing at the highest rates of any country in Asia, and therefore have a disproportionate impact on greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming.

The potential economic, social and environmental benefits of finding a solution to ensuring the sustainability of forest management are very timely for the Delta. The potential investments in mangrove conservation, and associated value chains could significantly contribute to achievement of Myanmar’s Nationally Determined Contribution targets, as well as key sectoral polices and strategies for climate change mitigation and REDD+, adaptation and sustainable development.

In a series of workshops and site visits, GGGI facilitated discussions on the range of current forestry and fishery value chain activities in the region to assess what stakeholders see as the barriers to developing or scaling up these activities.

Dr Aaron Russell, Ingvild Solvang, Luis Miguel Aparicio and Programme Officer Thiha Aung met with remote communities and Forest Department on the Delta to discuss community forest restoration activities.

The establishment of community forestry projects are seen as a useful means to stabilize and reforest mangrove forests. Local communities strongly recognize the importance of mangroves to provide households with firewood, house and boat building materials. However, a frequently overlooked benefit from mangroves is that they provide natural habitat for Myanmar’s highly sought-after mud-crabs, prawns, blood cockles, and other fish species. Some of these lucrative delicacies provide income for large numbers of landless rural households in the Delta.

Consistent stories were heard during the mission. Existing laws restrict those wanting to own and manage lands. In some communities up to 70% of the population may be effectively landless. There is a shortage of livelihood opportunities in the Delta, and many are forced to seasonally migrate to cities to find work. Mangroves and other forests are often illegally logged as people have no other household cooking fuel options, or have no other option to make an income. There is a large demand for mangrove fuel wood and charcoal from the Delta that reaches as far as Yangon. The catches of crabs, fish and prawns are falling due to lost mangrove habitat, leading to fishers to selling all they catch, including juveniles and females with eggs. This is leading to a cycle of debt for many landless people of the Delta, and as stated by a spokesperson of the Department of Fisheries “we need to conserve the mangroves to increase fishery value chains; their destruction is the primary reason for recent fishery stock depletion”.

Due to their remote location and unaffordable transport costs, many are unable to travel to the markets to sell their goods. Instead they rely on selling to a buyer who comes to them but are forced to sell at often half the market price. Many landless people want to diversify their incomes but lack access to affordable finance without a land title, or knowledge of market demands.

“Community Forestry could ensure people’s rights to sustainable use of forest resources, improve people’s livelihoods also in fishery value chains. These synergies between social, environmental and economic benefits are good examples of what green growth is about”, says Dr. Aaron Russell, Country Representative for GGGI in Myanmar.

Village community members show us their catch of mud crabs that are ready to be sold to the buyer. Fishers know that selling juvenile or female crabs is not sustainable but they have few income options in remote areas.

Initial value chain analysis shows that with the right financial, technological and institutional interventions, integrated community-based mangrove-fisheries management could be sustainable, would provide more diversity in incomes for the landless, thereby strengthening incentives to maintain and reforest mangroves.

In addition to mudcrab value chains, supplementary value chains that have the potential to contribute to these communities’ incomes are to integrate coconut palm or nipa palms and other shade trees around fish/prawn/crab ponds or integrated with the existing farms in agroforestry arrangements. Coconuts provides food, offers many applications for natural coconut fibres, and have the potential for export of virgin coconut oil. Nipa palm similarly has useful fibres, can be useful for livestock feed and there are indications of export demand for nipa palm buds. In addition, there are numerous natural extracts from mangroves that are used across south-east Asia as dyes and pigments, and even with medicinal properties that are underexplored in Myanmar. While individuals can improve their incomes on individually owned land, the sustainability of mangroves and recovery of many fishery species are more likely to be achieved if the economic needs of the whole community are taken into account.

Potential outcomes of integrated community forestry for climate change.

NGO Local community engagement in participatory workshop to assess potential for community forestry activities.

The mission team concluded that the promotion of community forestry and associated value-chains should form a key component of GGGI’s Coastal Landscape Restoration program. This early analysis will feed into further in-depth integrated value chain assessments by GGGI to design tailored solutions and interventions that are pro-poor and lead to socially inclusive benefits from direct and indirect use of restored and protected mangrove areas.

The Hungarian Government approved on December 21, 2018 (Government Decision 1770/2018. [XII. 21.]) the establishment of the Western Balkans Green Center (WBGC), a new instrument to support the implementation of the Paris Agreement. Designed with the support of GGGI under a cooperation project supported by the Ministry for Innovation and Technology of Hungary, the WBGF will support climate actions in six countries: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo*, Republic of Northern Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

The Government Decision calls for the set-up of a state-owned company, including financial provisions for the next three years. Responding to the needs of the countries, the WBGF will be complementary to existing instruments and will target areas that are under-financed such as climate adaptation. As early as 2019, the WBGC will support project preparation and capacity building in the region through grant financing in water management, forestry, sustainable energy for buildings and sustainable city sectors.

“The Hungarian Government in collaboration with the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) intends to support the green transition of the Western Balkan region through a dedicated fund. With the establishment of the Western Balkan Green Center, Hungary is showing its commitment to the Paris Agreement. The project will result in concrete actions to support climate mitigation and adaptation in a neighboring region”. (Dr. Peter Kaderják, Secretary of State for Energy Affairs and Climate Policy).

The proposal is the result of extensive consultation at regional level, studies and analysis. Furthermore, the proposal was developed under the strategic guidance of an Advisory Committee composed of representatives of ministries, policy experts and other stakeholders.

“I am delighted that GGGI supported the design of an instrument that will help the region meet its objectives under the Paris Agreement. I see a critical role for this Hungarian initiative in supporting green infrastructure investments. GGGI estimates that every USD 100,000 in project preparation funds during the Fund’s first phase may mobilize USD 10 million in infrastructure investments”. (Ban-Ki-Moon, President and Chair of GGGI)

The WBGC is the first step of a broader, more ambitious endeavor, to create a regional multi-donor fund in 2021 supporting project implementation, using blended finance and targeted financial instruments for beneficiaries in Western Balkans. The Government proposal also calls for the set-up of an international committee and further engagement with the Visegrad and other Central European countries for the establishment of the regional multi-donor fund in 2021.
 

*This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244/1999 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence.

By Mizan Khan and Dereje Senshaw
PARIS, Dec 27 2018 (IPS)

Emmanuel Macron was voted to French Presidency in 2017 with the mission of strengthening the integration of the European Union and pursuing economic and ecological reforms. So from the outset, he was set to distinguish himself, not just in Europe but on the world stage, especially after President Trump pulled the United States out of the Paris Agreement. So Macron held the summit meeting on `One Planet’ in Paris last December to push for stronger environment and climate policy. He also spoke of the environment when he addressed the Congress in April 2018, stating that “Let us face it: There is no Planet B.”ⁱ

As part of the package Macron initiated the new tax on gasoline to finance ecological transition and reduce budget deficit. France was set to increase the diesel tax by 6.5 Euro cents per liter and the gasoline tax by 3.9 cents per liter, which had already increased its gas and diesel taxes by several cents this year, and this shift came after years in which France, and Europe, had encouraged the use of diesel fuel as being better for the environment. Macron defended the Contribution Climat Énergie (CCE), a French version of the carbon tax, whose steady increase in recent years has brought about a growing dispute over rising fuel prices. Since its adoption in 2013, the CCE has increased from year to year, putting pressure on fuel prices. In 2019, a ton of CO2 would have cost of €55 in France, the second highest in Europe.ⁱⁱ The CCE was decided when oil prices were still low. But it is way up now. Still fuel taxes are calculated lower than their social costs.ⁱⁱⁱ

The increase this time was resented by the French voters, initially by the rural constituencies and then the city dwellers including the Parisians joined. The result was violent protests for two weeks led by the Yellow Vest Movement. Finally, the government gave in, with declarations of some concessions, both by the President and his Prime Minister, to deflate the protests and assuage the public. But the rating of the President has plummeted to the lowest since he occupied the Presidency. Finally, the proposed tax has been shelved at least for 2019.

Why was the reaction so violent? What has gone wrong?

Introduction of different types of eco-tax, or fuel/carbon tax is decades old in Europe and they have not met the same fate. Why? Media reports and post-mortem of the episode point to a range of factors:

1. Macron’s government is viewed by a large segment of general public as elitist, which bank on support from technocrats and business leaders. The voters at large feel they are marginalized from any consultations. Even the CCE is reported to be little-known among French people, many of whom have only recently discovered it when they are already feeling disgruntled with this year’s tax rises.

2. It is the increase in the price of oil this year that has added to the tax’s impact. The price of petrol in France is already the highest in Europe. The €55 cost of a CO2/ton in France compares with the European price of €17/ton.^iv The French CCE affects both private individuals and businesses, generating almost €7 billion a year through the prices of all fuels, including fuel oil, gas, petroleum, diesel and coal.^v

3. These tax inequalities are a problem, according to experts. The tax disproportionately hits those on the lowest incomes, who receive an ‘energy cheque’ of €150 if they do not pay any tax.^vi So the CCE, a French version of the carbon tax, whose steady increase in recent years has brought about a growing dispute over rising fuel prices. Macron’s tax policies have alienated many in the middle class — and analysis of the 2018-19 budget showed incomes of the poorest households would get worse under his plans.^vii

4. The target of spending the revenue generated by this new tax was misplaced – it was mostly meant for reduction of budget deficit. Of the €34 billion the government will raise on fuel taxes in 2018, a sum of only €7.2 billion is earmarked for environmental measures.^viii

5. The most polluting industries are viewed to be paying less, and many industrial sectors are exempted, including agriculture, all of the industry sectors enjoy emissions allowances, including road, air and maritime transport, agriculture and fish farming. The French ecological tax hits private individuals harder than businesses due to these exceptions. The Institute for Climate Economics (I4CE), a think-tank in a memo clarified that removing these exemptions would bring in twice as much money for France, around €14 billion.^ix

6. Analysts say the fuel tax will disproportionately affect residents of rural areas, fueling claims that Macron is out of touch with the French people. Most of the rural residents have to depend on private cars, and diesel fuel, unlike in larger cities served by central heating. This was the reason that the protests began in the provinces and then spread in the cities including Paris. The fuel taxes represent in the eyes of many an urban ignorance of the reality of life in rural areas relatively unserved by train lines or other forms of public transportation. At the same time the railway company is closing the non-TGV, less profitable lines in some routes.

7. So, a perception developed among the rural protesters that they have two Frances, Parisian France and the `other’ France. So Macron has been dubbed “President of the Rich” by many working-class citizens who saw him remove the wealth tax from his rich Paris constituency, then propose a gas tax on his “other” constituency.^x Lionel Cucchi, a spokesman of YVM in Marseille, told BFM TV that protesters “demands are much bigger than this moratorium” … we have to stop stealing from the pockets of low-income taxpayers.”^xi So, the issue here is about redistribution of income.

Experience in other countries

World Bank estimates that 46 countries and 25 sub-national entities charge some kind of carbon price, even if that policy applies to only one sector of their economy.^xii Sweden and the United Kingdom have successfully run carbon taxes for years. Sweden as the pioneer has taxed all forms of energy since the 1950s and adjusted the levy to account for carbon in 1991, well before climate change became a high-profile global agenda. The result is its emissions declined by 26 percent in the years that followed.^xiii

There are other examples of carbon taxes in Europe and beyond. Many European countries have imposed taxes on emissions of common air pollutants such as sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides. Also, a number of countries have imposed energy taxes or energy taxes based partly on carbon content. Some other green growth and climate-conscious countries have adopted carbon taxes, including Chile, Spain, Ukraine, Ireland and nations in Scandinavia. Others have adopted cap-and-trade programs that effectively put prices on carbon emissions. Many developing countries including Bangladesh, China, India and some others also have introduced different kinds of eco-taxes including carbon pricing. However, only around 12 percent of global emissions are covered by pricing programs such as taxes on the carbon content of fossil fuels or permit trading programs that put a price on emissions, according to the International Monetary Fund.^xiv

Britain may offer some relevant lessons. It only imposed a carbon tax on electricity generation in 2013, helping drive emissions lower. But climate policy has a long and cross-party history in the U.K with its parliament being almost unanimous in adopting an aggressive climate bill a decade ago. This cross-party commitment is the way to implement an enduring climate policy, which touches the very foundations of modern life. California, for instance, is the only U.S. state with a strong climate policy. Yet its first policies came in 2006 at the hand of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a moderate Republican. Subsequent Democratic governments have built on that initial foundation.

But Canada is about to offer a test case, with its province of British Columbia leading a successful case of carbon tax for several years. In the rest of Canada, despite the success story in British Columbia, other provinces are dragging their heels. Prime Minister Trudeau has unveiled a “backstop” carbon tax of $20 a ton, to take effect in January, for the four Canadian provinces that do not already have one. Trudeau’s policy, however, is designed pragmatically: about 90 percent of the revenue from the tax will be paid back to Canadians in the form of annual “climate action incentive.”^xv Because of the progressive tax rates, about 70 percent of Canadians will get back more than they paid. If they choose to be more energy efficient, they could save even more.^xvi

However, by design, the British Columbia plan was the simplest: it slapped a tax on any fossil fuels used for heating, electricity and transportation. Each person and business was expected to shoulder the burden of pricing pollution; no loopholes, no exemptions. This revenue-neutral carbon tax was unbiased: tax was based on pollution intensity of products or services. This has induced behavioral change among consumers. The move, the first of its kind in Canada, placated both conservative economists and environmentalists.

So, based on experience we can say that the prospects of carbon taxes may depend on what happens to the money raised. In the British Columbia case, all the tax money raised went back to the people. The World Bank has called it the text book instrument. The economist William Nordhaus, winner of this year’s Nobel Prize for economics, supported the British Columbian model as an ideal for export to other economies. Fears that the tax would have a negative impact on the economy quickly dissipated when the numbers came in, as reports suggest. The province grew its economy by 16%, far outpacing any other region of the country.^xvii

The revenue-neutral aspect of the tax is novel but has frustrated some environmental groups, who feel the tax does not do enough to reduce emissions. So the current British Columbia government is thinking of modifying the revenue-neutral aspect of the programme in order to allocate funding for green infrastructure, deviating from its original revenue neutrality. By 2012, when the tax reached its first maximum level ($30 per ton), 64% of the population supported it. By 2016, the support shot up to nearly 70% of residents.^xviii

So a big difference between Canada’s carbon tax and France’s carbon tax is where the money is going. In the provinces that will use Canada’s carbon tax instead of their own plan, 90 per cent of the revenue from the taxes are expected to be refunded during tax time, the government says.^xix But in France the overwhelming share was supposed to go for reduction of budget deficit. Without substantive dialogue with the main stakeholder groups before designing the programme, it has backfired.

Use of French experience by sceptics

The unhappy experience in France obviously gave fodder to feed the sceptics like the French Far Right, or Presidents Trump, who still remains a diehard climate denialist. In a tweeter Trump had to say that Macron’s setback showed he was right and justified again that US was not going to clean up pollution caused by others! Fuel taxes, however, generate revenue that stays inside home countries without going to pay for others’ pollution. And the Paris Agreement placed much greater responsibilities on developing countries than ever before. President Trump’s rugged nationalist tends to infect some other leaders at a time when there is the need for promoting multilateralism, as shown in the recent climate negotiations in Katowice.

Despite Trump’s self-righteous justification, 10 east coast states have a `cap & trade’ system for carbon emissions since 2009, under which companies have their emissions capped and then trade any surplus or deficit with others. But Barack Obama, while president, was unable to pass a nationwide system. Some prominent Republicans have backed for a revenue-neutral carbon tax, but with little success yet.

Future for green growth strategy

France’s abortive attempt offers some sobering lessons, with a dilemma: how do political leaders introduce policies that will do long-term good for the environment without losing their chances of re-election? The challenge is to consider the equity and distributional aspects of introducing environmental/carbon tax, together with ensuring universal access to clean fuel and transport. Suh argues that this requires income-group and spatially-specific policies. This kind of policies aimed at transition to a low-carbon economy need to be grounded on local and national level stakeholder consultations for a revenue-neutrality system, particularly for the poorest. Such a consensus can gradually mature with intensive campaign of public education and awareness aimed at behavioral change. The median voters need to be placated in that in this age of environmental crises, what a society needs is to penalize the Bads, such as pollution and incentivize the Goods, such as hard-earned income by the working class. With this policy for some time, the revenue generated from environmental Bads can gradually be shifted to a green growth strategy nationwide.

The tax rises appear to fit within a pro-Green agenda espoused by Macron’s government. His intentions were not bad in revamping the culture of polluting driving and the protesters are also not against climate change or green growth. Simply the time is bad for the working classes in France and elsewhere, where uneven globalization and lack of distributive justice do not provide any cushion to the poorest communities. So the climate-and green growth-friendly governments must remain in check in devising green policy instruments such a way that do not backfire & play into the hands of populist demagogue leaders around.

Finally, we can say that whatever skepticism is there, the outlook for green instruments like carbon taxes looks bright: reports show that 88 nations, representing more than half of global emissions, say they are or will use carbon pricing to tackle climate change. Furthermore, some states have suggested they would impose carbon border levies on imported goods from nations that do not tax carbon. However, this policy should be applied to major emitters across the aisle.

Let us recall that Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal at a very bad time in the US was not a tax programme, even if it included taxes. Instead, it was the greatest of all stimulus and jobs bills. We now need to craft a Green New Deal based on growth and distributive justice.

ⁱ https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/12/france-yellow-vest-climate-action/577642/
ⁱⁱ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/frances-protesters-are-part-of-a-global-backlash-against-climate-change-taxes/2018/12/04/08365882-f723-11e8-863c-9e2f864d47e7_story.html?utm_term=.70945e2904f8
ⁱⁱⁱ Suh, S. 2018. Low-carbon transition: changing urgently and equitably. Available at: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/change-urgently-but-slowly-equitably-same-time-sangwon-suh/?articleId=6474975376325115904#comments-6474975376325115904&trk=prof-post
^iv https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/frances-protesters-are-part-of-a-global-backlash-against-climate-change-taxes/2018/12/04/08365882-f723-11e8-863c-9e2f864d47e7_story.html?utm_term=.70945e2904f8
^v https://www.euractiv.com/section/climate-environment/news/french-dispute-over-carbon-tax-highlights-flaws-of-its-ecological-tax/
^vi https://www.euractiv.com/section/climate-environment/news/french-dispute-over-carbon-tax-highlights-flaws-of-its-ecological-tax/
^vii https://www.euractiv.com/section/climate-environment/news/french-dispute-over-carbon-tax-highlights-flaws-of-its-ecological-tax/
^viii https://www.euractiv.com/section/climate-environment/news/french-dispute-over-carbon-tax-highlights-flaws-of-its-ecological-tax/ ; https://globalnews.ca/news/4728184/france-carbon-tax-riots-canada/
^ix https://www.euractiv.com/section/climate-environment/news/french-dispute-over-carbon-tax-highlights-flaws-of-its-ecological-tax/
^x https://thefederalist.com/2018/12/17/carbon-tax-riots-may-breaking-point-frances-socialism/
^xi https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/04/world/europe/france-fuel-tax-yellow-vests.html
^xii https://carbonpricingdashboard.worldbank.org/
^xiii https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/12/france-yellow-vest-climate-action/577642/
^xiv https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/frances-protesters-are-part-of-a-global-backlash-against-climate-change-taxes/2018/12/04/08365882-f723-11e8-863c-9e2f864d47e7_story.html?utm_term=.e7c114d785d3
^xv https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/frances-protesters-are-part-of-a-global-backlash-against-climate-change-taxes/2018/12/04/08365882-f723-11e8-863c-9e2f864d47e7_story.html?utm_term=.e7c114d785d3
^xvi https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/frances-protesters-are-part-of-a-global-backlash-against-climate-change-taxes/2018/12/04/08365882-f723-11e8-863c-9e2f864d47e7_story.html?utm_term=.24e04590073f
^xvii https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/dec/04/how-to-make-a-carbon-tax-popular-give-the-profits-to-the-people
^xviii https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/dec/04/how-to-make-a-carbon-tax-popular-give-the-profits-to-the-people
^xixi https://globalnews.ca/news/4728184/france-carbon-tax-riots-canada/
^xx Suh, 2018 (endnote ii).

Excerpt:

City view of Hanoi, Vietnam. Vietnam is prioritising green growth. Credit: Adam Bray/IPS

By Pascal Laureyn
PHNOM PENH, Dec 18 2018 (IPS)

Vietnam’s shift from a centrally planned to a market economy has transformed the country. And while it is now is one of the most dynamic emerging countries in Southeast Asia, this has sometimes been at the expense of the environment. But the country has begun to prioritise green growth.

Vietnam’s economic growth has been accompanied by significant rural to urban migration, which has led to increased social and environmental challenges. Over the past decade, 700 square kilometres of land has been converted into urban areas. Vietnam’s emissions per unit of GDP are surpassing all other Asia-Pacific developing countries, except for China. This is fuelled by domestic coal consumption, which currently accounts for 36 percent of electricity supply and is projected to increase 56 percent by 2030.

But recently the concept of an inclusive green economy has emerged as a strategic priority in the country. A green growth economy is one that improves human well-being and builds social equity while reducing environmental risks.

The intergovernmental organisation, the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), is trying to promote just that. GGGI is working to increase green energy production and reduce greenhouse gases emissions and has been assisting with the development of green master plans, strategies for renewable energy and bankable projects for Vietnam’s cities.

IPS spoke to Adam Ward, the Country Representative of GGGI for Vietnam. Excerpts of the interview follow.

Adam Ward, the Country Representative of Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) for Vietnam says that his organisation is working on policies for the growth of green cities. Courtesy: Adam Ward

Inter Press Service (IPS): GGGI does not donate funds. So how can you develop green growth?

Adam Ward (AW): We support planning for projects like solar power and electric buses. We also seek finance for the government and the private sector at accessible rates so these projects can get implemented.

We have worked with the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) to develop guidelines for prioritisation and allocation of funding to public infrastructure. We have also worked on a process to solicit projects from small and medium enterprises and appraise them. We helped them to understand how to submit projects and access financing.

The government sees the value in our work. With MPI, we developed a handbook for the appraisal of public investment projects, [which is] becoming government policy. Projects worth over four billion dollars have been appraised under this inclusive framework. Like components of the airport, metro lines in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. It is really great to see that our guidelines are being used for sustainable growth.

IPS: Economic growth needs energy. How do you keep it sustainable?

AW: For example, we advised the government on generating energy from bagasse (the dry pulpy residue that remains after sugarcane is crushed to extract the juice). And how much can they potentially generate, how much investment is required and how to sell it to the grid. This makes sense, both economically and environmentally. It is clean energy that can be sold. Then we presented our advice to the government on better tariffs to stimulate the production of this green energy.

IPS: Does GGGI advise on national policies. How does it affect local decision making?

AW: We are also working on policies for the growth of green cities. The Ministry of Construction has already approved one of our suggestions, which has been incorporated into an Urban Green Growth Development Plan. Another one is the set-up of green growth indicators. Cities are now legally required to report the implementation of green growth. We also worked on waste water treatment and city planning. And we are kicking off a project on generating energy with municipal waste.

IPS: Vietnam has only recently risen out of poverty. Is green growth a real concern?

AW: There is definitely openness for green growth. Vietnam wants their development to be inclusive, sustainable and as green as possible. However, what we have seen is that growth has taken an upper hand on the environment. What we really want to tell the government is that the quality of growth matters for the future. [Especially] in Vietnam, a country that is very vulnerable to climate change.

Emissions are increasing rapidly. There are challenges with air quality in cities. Growth is important, we recognise that Vietnam wants to develop. But our message is that the quality of growth matters too. By embracing green growth there will be no downsides in terms of economic development.

IPS: What are the challenges facing GGGI?

AW: Vietnam has a high energy demand. And given the GDP growth, it will increase dramatically. They want to meet a large part of that via coal, which will have a serious impact on carbon emissions. But it will also pollute the surrounding cities and the agricultural lands surrounding coal plants. That’s going to be a massive challenge.

The second challenge facing Vietnam is climate change. The Mekong Delta is one of the most vulnerable places in the world to climate change. Sea level rise and droughts are more common. Typhoons are more extreme.

The third area is the cities. Around 30 percent of the population lives in or around cities. This is set to increase to over 50 percent by 2050.
This brings a lot of benefits in terms of economic development, however, this mass influx of people brings challenges in terms of infrastructure in a way to support transport, housing, etc. This is exactly why GGGI is working on renewable energy, sustainable waste management, providing guidance on increasing investment into green projects and also specifically working with cities to make them cleaner.

Global Green Growth Institute’s Director General Frank Rijsberman at COP24. GGGI is organising over 15 events at the conference focused on low carbon development, green finance, transparency, capacity development of countries to address climate change etc. Credit: Sohara Mehroze Shachi/IPS

By Sohara Mehroze Shachi
KATOWICE, Poland, Dec 13 2018 (IPS)

When the Global Green Growth Institute’s (GGGI) Director General Frank Rijsberman’s son was looking for a job following graduation, he saw that oil companies were paying the highest salaries. But Rijsberman, who has been working in the sustainable development sector for decades, knew better. He told his son that those very same oil companies would soon go broke. And instead advised him to seek employment with renewable energy companies as they would soon be the ones making money.

As head of GGGI, it is undoubtable that Rijsberman has expert insight into the future of the renewable energy sector. GGGI supports governments around the world transition to environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive economic growth by helping them mobilise finance for climate action and implement their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) i.e. country commitments for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and adapting to climate change.

With a career spanning over 30 years, Rijsberman is one of the strongest advocates of green growth attending the 24th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP24) in Katowice, Poland. His organisation is organising over 15 events at the conference that are focused on, among other things, how low carbon development, green finance, transparency and capacity development of countries can address climate change.

Amidst his packed COP24 schedule, Rijsberman sat down with IPS for a brief interview on the state of global climate action, COP24 and the work of GGGI in attaining green growth.

Excerpts from the interview follow:

Inter Press Service (IPS): Climate finance has been one of the sticking points at COP24 so far. Developing countries are concerned that the developed world is shifting the role of financial contributions to the private sector. What are your thoughts on this?

Dr. Frank Rijsberman (FR): Firstly, there needs to be a clean definition of the 100 billion dollars climate finance pledged to the Green Climate Fund (GCF). This 100 billion shouldn’t be diluted. We need this 100 billion to be clean and green. But at the same time, this is only a small part of what we need to fight climate change. We need trillions, and for that public finance is not enough. This will only come about if we get the institutional investors off the sideline and get the pension funds, the private sector to engage.

IPS: What are some of the challenges that now exist with regards to engaging the private sector in funding green growth and how can they be engaged more effectively?

FR: It starts with many of the governments not even realising that renewable energy has become commercially viable. They still think green growth is nice but it is expensive and [they] can’t afford it. It is already commercially viable to use solar-based batteries for instance, so there is a business case there. So convincing people that these are commercially attractive investments is the first thing that needs to be done. If structured well enough, [as in the case of] Bangladesh offering 20-year power purchase agreement at a reasonable price, then we can attract private investors.

Governments also must create an enabling environment for the private sector to engage and have a level playing field for renewables to attract those investments. If there are barriers, such as fossil fuel subsidies, it becomes very hard for private businesses to make a living out of renewables. In Fiji, for instance, the government subsidises dirty electricity for poor households. Stopping that subsidy and turning it into a subsidy for solar power on the roofs of low income houses is one of our projects.

IPS: Two months ago, the IPCC released a report that confirmed that accepting increased global warming of 2 degrees Celsius will impact severely lives, livelihoods and natural ecosystems. This means drastic changes are needed to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Is it achievable here?

FR: It has to be finance first. Then we need to agree on transparency. We also need to ramp up ambition and rather than to waver from their NDCs countries need to step up their commitments, but that is for next year. We need to agree on the rulebook and get over the hurdle of finance at this COP then everybody’s attention will focus on more ambition, which is what we need. If we get stuck on the Paris rulebook or finance then we also don’t get to the 1.5 degrees, so it is like a house of cards.

IPS: Transparency is one of the key issues being debated at COP24. What are your thoughts on it?

FR: Transparency is the code word for Article 6. Part of it means developed countries reporting in a credible way. And for developing countries it also means to save their rainforests, to restore their mangrove areas – can they get money to pay for that? There are countries like Korea or Australia that can’t reduce their emissions fast enough, but they are willing to buy carbon credits. But then we need to agree on a rulebook for transparency – how are we going to report, what kind of Monitoring Reporting and Verification Systems (MRVS) are necessary, and those MRVS shouldn’t overly burden countries like Myanmar.

We can’t have the same kind of rulebook for Myanmar and Germany [and] shouldn’t make the barriers to access very high. Small Island Developing States (SIDS) felt they were excluded because [these processes] were too complicated. So, this time around transparency needs to allow the Least Developed Countries and SIDS to really access that. That is the critical sticking point.

IPS: Your organisation assists member states, which include developing nations, access funding from the GCF. It has also assisted member countries in developing green growth models to great success. Are you seeing an increased commitment from governments, in both developing and developed nations, to embrace green growth? What is your vision for GGGI going ahead from COP24?

FR: We are very proud that we supported Fiji in developing one of the first low emission development scenarios, which they are presenting here at COP. Last year we worked with Fiji to have their NDC roadmap. This is just an example of the kind of things we do. We also work with many developing countries in getting more concrete action plan for NDCs. We are growing very rapidly.

We only started six years ago with 12 countries and now 30 countries have ratified our treaty and another 30 are in the queue to become members. When our President Ban Ki-moon meets ministers he encourages them to take green growth more seriously, then those ministers contact us about how they can do so.

We also see a lot of good opportunities from the SIDS.

In South East Asia – Vietnam, Indonesia – there is a large portfolio of planned new coal fired power plants. So, these are the hotspots and we need to convince those governments that green growth is commercially attractive and feasible. We are very happy with Indonesia’s commitment for green growth and we are strongly supporting Vietnam’s government to convert their intent to climate action.

I have worked on sustainable development forever, and for the longest time Ministries of Finance had no time for us, saying ‘Sorry we are poor, we need to grow and we will worry about the environment later’. Even INDCs were owned by the Ministries of Environment and the Ministries of Finance didn’t know about them.

Now the Finance Ministers who want growth are interested in green growth, integrating these ideas into mainstream national development planning. For instance, we helped Uganda develop the green growth development strategy which the ministry of finance is leading. That is what I am most excited about. We have finally convinced ministries of finance to take green growth seriously.

Excerpt:

A wind energy generation plant located in Loiyangalani in northwestern Kenya. The plant is set to be the biggest in Africa, generating 300 MW. Credit: Isaiah Esipisu/IPS

By Isaiah Esipisu
KATOWICE, Poland, Dec 11 2018 (IPS)

In order for African countries to implement their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) and Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), they will require further human capacity building, and there must be involvement of the private sector from the start of the planning process.

This is according to preliminary findings of a study on green growth trends and readiness across the continent jointly conducted by the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) in collaboration with the African Development Bank (AfDB).

The NDCs spell out the actions countries intend to take to address climate change, both in terms of adaptation and mitigation, and the SDGs are a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity.

The early findings of the report titled Green Growth Readiness Assessment in Africa was released on the sidelines of the 24th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP24) in Katowice, Poland yesterday Dec. 10. Seven countries; Morocco, Tunisia Senegal Gabon, Rwanda Kenya and Mozambique, were selected for the pilot phase.

The scientists presented the findings as climate talks in Katowice entered the second week of negotiations, a stage where political leaders decide whether or not to adapt recommendations brought forth following the first week of technical engagements.

The report stated that high-level political commitment, appropriate policies and implementation of government strategic plans are the key drivers of green growth among African countries.

“Governments need to look at this [NDCs and SDGs] as commercial business opportunities,” said Dr. Frank Rijsberman, the Director General for GGGI. Surprisingly, he said, “I have asked a number of private investors as to why they do not invest in this sector, and the answer is not lack of finances, instead they say it is because of government policies.”

The need for sound policies was reiterated by Anthony Nyong, Director for Climate Change and Green Growth at the AfDB, who said that there must be an enabling environment for countries to achieve the much-desired green growth.

“After this assessment report, findings will be shared across the board so that countries can learn from each other,” said Nyong.

According to Dr. Pranab Baruah, one of the lead researchers from GGGI, some of the seven countries in the study have demonstrated high level leadership commitment that confirms their willingness to implement a green growth model.

In Kenya, for example, the researchers said that there is a National Climate Change Council that is chaired by the country’s President Uhuru Kenyatta. The council oversees the implementation of the National Climate Change Action Plan and also advises national and sub-national bodies on mainstreaming, legislative and implementation measures for climate change.

Kenya is currently producing the highest amount of geothermal energy in Africa with an output of 534 megawatts (MW), and 84 percent of all electricity installations consist of green energy.

The country is also in the process of constructing the largest wind firm in Africa with a potential capacity of 300 MW.

This is despite the government’s unpopular plan to construct the largest coal plant in sub-Saharan Africa. However, yesterday Kenya’s Environment Cabinet Secretary Keriako Tobiko told IPS  that the government is likely going to reconsider whether to proceed with construction of the coal plant.

But above all, said Baruah, the study found that Kenya’s recent introduction of a green growth curriculum in schools was key to the development of human capacity.

Rwanda is another country whose green growth is spearheaded from the highest political level. While most countries around the world wait for finances for mitigation projects to come from the Green Climate Fund, Rwanda is already mobilising and disbursing funds nationally.

The researchers said that Rwanda has created a 100-million-dollar National Fund for Climate and the Environment (FONERWA) as an instrument for financing the country’s needs on environment, climate change, and green growth.

In the same vein, Senegal is in the process of removing financial barriers for private sector participation through pilot projects. The country has a 200-million-dollar Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Fund (REEF), which provides financial incentives to private sector led pilot projects, such as lengthening the refinancing period for the small businesses.

The study also found that countries require urgent financing readiness, especially with the emergence of Green Climate Fund and that there is an urgent need for the strengthening of policy and planning frameworks for green growth. Countries studied also needed to address weak monitoring and reporting systems and work to enhance wider stakeholder buy-in to the green growth agenda.

A traffic jam, in Indonesia's capital Jakarta. Air pollution in Jarkarta is triple the the maximum “safe” level recommended by the World Health Organisation. The country's government says it is committed to making the switch to renewables. Credit: Alexandra Di Stefano Pironti/IPS

By Sohara Mehroze Shachi
KATOWICE, Poland, Dec 11 2018 (IPS)

Although Indonesia has attained decent economic growth of over five percent in the last decade, in order to ensure sustainable growth in the future the switch to renewable energy (RE) will be critical, says the country’s government.
“If we don’t focus on low carbon development, we cannot continue this growth,” Bambang Brodjonegoro, Indonesia’s Minister of National Development Planning, said yesterday Dec. 10.

He spoke about Indonesia’s shift to a low carbon, climate-friendly development pathway at a high-level panel discussion at the 24th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP24), which is currently being held in Katowice, Poland. The panel discussion was organised by the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), in partnership with the Ministry of National Development Planning of the Republic of Indonesia (BAPPENAS).

The latest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warns of catastrophic climatic impacts if global warming is not kept below 1.5 degrees Celsius. This will include severe impact on food production and increasing risks of climate-related disasters.

But according to Brodjonegoro, the Indonesian government is taking this issue seriously.
“We are fully committed to steer our economy for low carbon development. We will mainstream a low carbon framework in our medium-term development plan,” he said, adding that low carbon development in Indonesia would involve improving environmental quality, attaining energy efficiency, increasing agriculture productivity, improving reforestation and reducing deforestation simultaneously.

There is a large scope for RE development in Indonesia, as most of its potential is unrealised as of now. According to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) report on Indonesia’s RE prospects, the country has “an estimated 716 GW of theoretical potential for renewable energy-based power generation”. But of its bioenergy potential of 32.7 GW, it has developed a mere 1.8 GW.

“In order to provide the electricity for remote areas, this is a good time to promote renewable energy as this will increase the percentage of renewable energy in our energy mix,” Brodjonegoro said.

According to the minister, a key issue for scaling up RE in Indonesia lies with developing the capacity of stakeholders to meet the needs of different types of investors to access finance.

Bambang Brodjonegoro, Indonesia’s Minister of National Development Planning, said the switch to renewable energy is critical for his country’s sustainable economic growth. He was speaking at a panel discussion held at COP24 in Katowice, Poland. Credit: Sohara Mehroze Shachi/IPS

Dr. Frank Rijsberman, Director General of GGGI, echoed these thoughts, stating that the critical factor for proliferating renewables in Indonesia is whether it can attract private sector investment.

“Both governments and the private sector have not fully incorporated the idea that green growth is not only nice but it is also affordable,” he said. “Businesses should be investing in renewable energy because there is a business opportunity.”
In this regard, he said that blended finance could be a critical path where every dollar investment from donors could catalyse other investments from private sources.

State Secretary for Climate and Environment in Norway Sveinung Rotevatn, was a panelist at the event. He stated that Norway is encouraged by the low carbon development in Indonesia, and is committing substantial funds to reduce deforestation there. According to Global Forest Watch, Indonesia experienced a drop in tree cover loss in 2017, including a 60 percent decline in primary forest loss. The organisaiton said that this could be in part to the 2016 government moratorium on the conversion of peatland.

“As a developed country we see [Norway] as having a responsibility to contribute,” he said. Norway has been working in partnership with Indonesia since 2010.

The future of oil is not bright, and Rotevatn believes the shift in production to gas from coal could be a useful bridge towards a shift to renewables in the long run. He added that resistance in this transition from fossil fuels to renewables is expected.

“In 1991 Norway introduced a carbon tax. Today we consider it a natural thing but implementing it is always hard,” he said. One estimate from the Norwegian environmental agency shows that since Norway reduced emissions in 1991 it continued healthy economic growth.

However, Indonesia has a long way to go in the transition process as over 90 percent of its energy still comes from fossil fuels. But the government is optimistic of its potential to scale up RE.

“We are focusing on incentivising renewable energy production and increasing infrastructure of renewable energy capacity. We have a lot of isolated islands and remote areas which can be utilised,” said Rida Mulyana, Director General of New, Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation (NREEC) at Indonesia’s Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources.

However, he noted that several challenges remain. One of these is public acceptance, as there is still a need for systematic and sustainable socialisation and education to minimise community resistance to RE projects.

Moreover, affordability of the available clean energy remains an issue, and the cost needs to be reduced for renewables to be a viable option. This is exacerbated by the fact that liquified petroleum gas is still subsidised, which fosters Indonesia’s dependency on fossil fuels.

While Mulayana pointed out financing as a key issue, he also said the government will not provide any subsidy for renewables and it has to compete with other sources of energy.

David Kerins, Senior Energy Economist at the European Investment Bank and another panelist at the event, said although RE projects are becoming more commercially viable, the private sector is yet to jump in on these investment opportunities. So there is a need to promote investment while providing safeguards to investors on the expected benefits.

“The RE energy sector has moved far beyond the situation it was before. Once people see how possible and straight forward it is, private sector can start targeting projects of its own,” he said.

Glenn Pearce-Oroz, Director for Policy and Programmes, Sustainable Energy for All (SEforALL), one of the attendees of the event, said one of the important next steps will be how to bring along commercial financing for low carbon development.

“Part of what we are seeing is private sector being more and more interested to do business in the green economy. What they are looking for though is clarity of roles and consistency in terms of the markets they are getting into,” he said.

“So the challenge for developing countries is how do you demonstrate that type of consistency and clarity and how do you establish clear rules of the game, good regulatory frameworks, that gives private sector the confidence to come into these markets?” He said Indonesia has the size, dynamism of economy and a lot of favourable elements for attracting private sector investment.

“Green growth as a concept is beginning to take off in different countries,” said Dr. Saleemul Huq, Director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) and a 24-time COP attendee.

“The most important element of any green growth strategy is to make sure it’s nationally determined and nationally owned,” he said, adding that modality of green growth is peculiar to the politics, socio economic conditions and culture of a country.

“Green growth is more of a political process than a technical process. There are vested interests and issues that have to be worked out at the national level,” he said. “The good news is it [green growth] has started to happen.”

• This story has been published with support from Inter Press Service, the Stanley Foundation, Earth Journalism Network and Climate Change Media Partnership.

Frank Rijsberman Director-General, Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) speaking in Kigali, at a week-long Africa Green Growth Forum 2018 to discuss how to foster green growth. Credit: Emmanuel Hitimana/IPS

By Emmanuel Hitimana
KIGALI, Nov 30 2018 (IPS)

Over 1000 policy makers, experts, investors and financial specialists from across Africa are gathered this week in Kigali, at a week-long Africa Green Growth Forum 2018 to discuss how to foster green, made-in-Africa innovations to meet the needs of the continent. 

There is no doubt that green growth is a number one priority for governments but many are mistaken if they believe green growth is more costly, Frank Rijsberman Director-General, Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) told delegates at the high level policy dialogue session.

Rwanda’s new Bugesera airport, will be the first-ever green airport in Africa, and the government’s biggest-ever project. It will have rain water harvesting and cut water use by 50 percent, and will have enough solar panels to make it zero carbon emission facility said Rijsberman.

“Did the airport become expensive by adopting these changes? No. It became cheaper by five million US dollars,” he said.

The over 800 million dollar project is being funded through a public private partnership, and is one of many green projects the GGGI is working on with the government of Rwanda. GGGI is also supporting the implementation of the government’s plan for green development of six secondary cities as well as eco-friendly tourism by introducing electric motorbikes or e-motorbikes.

The e-motorbikes will be cheaper than petrol-powered ones demonstrating that green products do not have to be expensive said Josh Whale, the Chief Executive Officer of Ampersand, a company that is building electric vehicles and charging stations in East Africa. Supported by GGGI, it has introduced e-motorbikes into Rwanda and has plans for other electric vehicles.

“Assembling all the e-motorcycles in Rwanda will certainly result in several thousand new jobs and will also green existing jobs. So motorcycle and taxis mechanics will become green jobs,” said Whale.

The Forum is showcasing a number of other green-friendly initiatives that promote  environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive economic growth.

There are many opportunities for green entrepreneurship and private investment in transport, infrastructure and agriculture in Africa, said Rijsberman.

“Involving the private sector more, helping to drive innovation, helping to drive entrepreneurship, creating green jobs has to be a growing part of government green growth strategies,” he says.

During different panels and sessions there were comments about a large gap in youth interests in the environment and green technology and the difficulty accessing funding for innovations that could bring affordable green technologies to Africa.

Academic training is one of the best investments to be made right now said Stephen Rodriques, Rwanda’s Country Director at the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). “We have to start preparing the young generation for green jobs,” Rodriques told delegates. “Many of the industries we have now are based on what we call the brown economy, where people are doing things and in ways that are destroying the environment.”

Rodriques also called for investment in innovative green projects and for stakeholders to improve their understanding and use of finance as a tool for climate resilience.

A common issue is quality projects in need of financing while financial institutions say they have the money for quality projects but can’t find them said Pablo Vieira, Global Director at NDC Partnership. This is a coalition of countries and institutions dedicated to strengthening collaboration among nations to help implement countries’ Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) to reduce carbon emissions under the Paris Agreement.

“We work in 36 countries right now with governments saying they have many projects ready for financing but find it hard to get finance,” said Vieira. Meanwhile financial institutions are looking to finance quality projects.

Acknowledging that governments afford to support all projects, Vieira calls for a new system to help entrepreneurs build quality projects. He also appealed to financial institutions to change their “business as usual” approach for the way environmental funds are delivered.

The forum started on Monday 26 November and is set to close on Friday November 30.

Arid drylands landscape near Niassante, Senegal. Baobab and acacia trees in the North Senegalese arid drylands landscape in Niassante Rural Community, Saint Louis Region, Senegal. Participants are meeting in Dakar to discuss how to turn development challenges into inclusive and sustainable green growth opportunities. Credit: ILRI/Jo Cadilhon

By Wambi Michael
KAMPALA, Nov 28 2018 (IPS)

Global Green Growth Week 2018 is taking take place in Dakar, Senegal from 26-29 November with a focus on strengthening collaborations, sharing experiences and best practices in the new green growth economy.

“Africa and Senegal in particular must now unlock their green growth potential at an even faster pace,” said Mamadou Konate, Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) Representative in Senegal Country officer. GGGI is a treaty-based international, inter-governmental organisation focused on a model of economic growth that is both environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive.

Over 240 participants are expected at Senegal’s first-ever Global Green Growth Week including key stakeholders from the public and private sectors, international organisations and representatives of civil society. Under the theme of “Unlocking Senegal’s green growth potential”, they will discuss how to turn development challenges into inclusive and sustainable green growth opportunities.

Agriculture, forestry and other land uses such as fisheries and aquaculture, livestock, tourism are the key sectors targeted for green growth opportunities. Despite the combined effects of climate change and globalisation, African economies have experienced impressive growth over the last decade, and it is mainly agriculture and natural resources said Konate.

An important topic under discussion will be resource mobilisation through the establishment of national financial vehicles and capacity building for the development of bankable green projects, he said.

Green growth involves the creation green jobs, the reduction of green house gas emissions, increased access to clean affordable energy, sustainable public transport, improved sanitation, and sustainable waste management. It also means improved air quality, adequate supply of ecosystem services and enhanced adaptation to climate change.

This edition of GGG Week 2018 includes a high-level political dialogue on the challenges and opportunities of a national green growth strategy. Other topics include capacity building, the integration of environmental economics into training curricula; information sharing on an initiative for the establishment of developing country universities on climate change; evaluation of Senegal and Africa’s readiness for green growth.

There will also be a training session on strengthening capacities on climate finance and the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) and the sharing of knowledge under the The Paris Agreement on climate change.  NDCs are at the heart of the agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions with each country developing a plan to reduce their national emissions. 

The 2018 edition of Global Green Growth Week is jointly organized by GGGI, The Government of Senegal, The Korean Embassy in Senegal, International Renewable Energy Agency and the ECOWAS Center for Renewable Energies and Energy Efficiency.  A National Capacity Development Workshop,

entitled “Financing NDC Implementation in the Energy Sector”, in Dakar, on 27-28 November 2018 as part of the four-day event.

Brian Kakembo Galabuzi who founded Waste to Energy Youth Enterprise (WEYE) Clean Energy Company Ltd in Uganda which makes carbonised fuel briquettes from agricultural waste materials and organic waste. In Africa, over 640 million people have no access to electricity, with many relying on dirty sources of energy sources for heating, cooking and lighting. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS

By Ahn Mi Young
SEOUL, Nov 27 2018 (IPS)

An organic pesticide safe for farmers and the environment, and carbonised fuel briquettes made from agricultural waste materials and organic waste are all business ideas that promote a green economy.

The entrepreneurs who started these businesses are among the winners of this year’s ‘Greenprenuers’ Programme, which is designed by the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) to supercharge green growth start-ups. It was run with GGGI, Youth Climate Labs and Student Energy (SE).

The programme helps young entrepreneurs with innovative business ideas “take their idea from concept to business plan, for a solution that positively impacts the future of sustainable energy; water and sanitation; sustainable landscapes (forestry and agriculture); or green city development.”

“It was very amazing to be selected among the 10 finalists out of over 345 applicants from around the world,” said Brian Kakembo Galabuzi who founded Waste to Energy Youth Enterprise (WEYE) Clean Energy Company Ltd in Uganda. It makes carbonised fuel briquettes from agricultural waste materials and organic waste.

In Uganda, 80 percent of solid waste is organic and can be used to produce cheaper and cleaner cooking charcoal briquettes that can substitute firewood.

The prize winner told IPS how he addressed the grassroots challenges he experienced with GGGI’s help.

He said like many young start-ups his biggest challenge was the lack of adequate finance, and limited experience that resulted in a process of trial and error.

“In the beginning, our targets were not that high so it was easy to achieve them, but through the ‘Greenprenuers’ programme we have learned to set bold targets and stand by them until we can achieve them,” said Galabuzi

Galabuzi added that ‘Greenprenuers’ helps with the two-most crucial requirements for the green growth start-ups: “It offers the right skills and knowledge through its 10-week web-based programme, and which is accompanied by an opportunity to win seed funding at the end of the programme.”

Galabuzi also explained that the programme helped him develop a well-structured business plan. “GGGI has also provided the seed funding through the ‘Greenprenuers’ programme, which has availed us finances to test out our business plan in a field seen as high risk by financing institutions in Uganda.”

Winners of this year’s ‘Greenprenuers’ Programme, which is designed by the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) to supercharge green growth start-ups.

Students of the programme were also given an opportunity to receive free consultations and be mentored by experts around the world who have built and run their won successful companies and organisations.

“This is something we would have paid a lot of money to get access to in conferences and training workshops, but we got for free,” said Galabuzi.

Meanwhile, the award came as a surprise to Jonathan Kent Sorensen, who is from Bumdest in Indonesia. His company produces CountrySide, an organic pesticide that is safe for both the environment and farmers.

Sorensen said through the module training his company was able to specify their target market and reach out to prospective customers. “Through this process, we could determine our package size to fit the local need, then to reasonably determine our prices,” he told IPS.

Thanks to the programme, Sorensen’s team secured an agreement for the field test with a local agriculture company. “If it was not because of ‘Greenprenuers’, we might never [have taken] the practical step to turn our research idea to a business idea,” said Sorensen.

Sirey Sum and Aaron Sexton from Cambodian Green Infrastructure (CGI) Social Enterprise also agreed that the 10-week course was helpful in turning their idea into a business.

CGI planned to work with the capital city of Phnom Penh to address stormwater and urban green space issues.

After decades of economic growth, Phnom Penh faces stormwater flooding and has very few urban green spaces.

“[The] lean startup model helped us to develop, and quickly adjust our business plan,” Sum told IPS.

Finally, the prize winners shared their future vision to take the next step.

Galabuzi said that for his company this would be to collaborate with the GGGI-Uganda office to take his idea to public institutions first, and hopefully later to  private intuitions.

“Through these collaboration, we can replicate this model to save the forest in Uganda. Also, it is essential to have access to affordable financing options,” he said.

“Youth unemployment in Uganda is so high yet the youth have great business ideas that if supported can create more jobs and boost the country’s economy. We need programmes like ‘Greenpreneurs’ to give us a platform to grow these ideas better into bankable projects or businesses,” he added.

Sorensen said that the next step for his company was to conduct a field test and to build a pilot plant with the seed capital. “It is essential for our start-up to have the right marketing method to the local farmers. In doing so, we think that we should work with local government agencies to convince that our product is worth to try.”