UPSC Express

What is Green Climate Fund?

• The Fund is a unique global platform to respond to climate change by investing in low-emission and climate-resilient development.
• GCF was established by 194 governments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in developing countries, and to help vulnerable societies adapt to the unavoidable impacts of climate change.
• Given the urgency and seriousness of this challenge, the Fund is mandated to make an ambitious contribution to the united global response to climate change.
• The Copenhagen Accord, established during the 15th Conference Of the Parties (COP-15) in Copenhagen in 2009 mentioned the “Copenhagen Green Climate Fund”.
• The fund was formally established during the 2010 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Cancun and is a fund within the UNFCCC framework.
• Its governing instrument was adopted at the 2011 UN Climate Change Conference (COP 17) in Durban, South Africa.
• GCF is accountable to the United Nations.
• It is guided by the principles and provisions of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
• It is governed by a Board of 24 members, comprising an equal number of members from developing and developed countries.
• The GCF is based in the new Songdo district of Incheon, South Korea.
• It is intended to be the centrepiece of efforts to raise Climate Finance of $100 billion a year by 2020.
• The Green Climate Fund is the only stand-alone multilateral financing entity whose sole mandate is to serve the Convention and that aims to deliver equal amounts of funding to mitigation and adaptation.