The United Nations Climate Change Executive Secretary, Simon Stiell, has called on countries to convert existing climate finance commitments into actual funding for developing nations, stressing that meeting financial targets alone would not be enough to address their needs.
Mr Stiell made the appeal on Friday during the seventh biennial high-level ministerial dialogue on climate finance at the 31st UN Climate Change Conference (COP31) in Antalya, Türkiye.
He noted that countries agreed on new climate finance targets at COP29, including an annual $300 billion commitment by 2035, led by developed nations, alongside a broader target of mobilising $1.3 trillion annually from all sources within the same period.
According to him, the Baku-to-Belém Roadmap provides a framework for achieving the targets but must be translated into practical action.
Mr Stiell said many developing countries continued to face a combination of rising debt, climate-related disasters and high borrowing costs, which limited their ability to invest in measures that would strengthen their resilience to climate change.
He explained that the risks of floods, wildfires, storms and droughts increased borrowing costs even before disasters struck. He added that declining revenues and growing recovery expenses following such events further worsened the debt burden of affected countries.
The UN climate chief stressed that climate finance should go beyond supporting individual projects to promoting wider economic transformation through stronger national institutions, improved investment conditions and access to more affordable capital.
He identified four key priorities for improving climate finance delivery: ensuring funding arrangements take countries’ debt situations into account, simplifying access to financial resources, strengthening domestic financial institutions and improving cooperation among governments, climate funds and development banks.
Mr Stiell emphasised that financing conditions should reflect the economic realities of individual countries, noting that grants and highly concessional loans remained particularly important for least developed countries, small island developing states and other vulnerable economies.
He also advocated simpler funding procedures and fewer administrative requirements, urging international financial institutions to strengthen existing national systems instead of bypassing them.
He said national treasuries, local governments, development banks and other domestic financial institutions should play leading roles in accessing and distributing climate finance.
Mr Stiell further called for stronger international cooperation involving financial support, technology transfer and capacity-building to transform countries’ development priorities into investments that improve climate resilience and people’s living conditions.
He said the ministerial dialogues, established in 2013, should help promote a new approach to climate finance, where development investments contribute to building stronger economies and a better future for all countries.
