And yet another worth the read~~still trying to find something that gives accounting of all the money the UN has gotten and how spent~~
complications for climate finance. Flickr/Adam Fagen
Last year, we looked at the extreme cuts to international climate finance the Trump administration put forward in their fiscal year 2018 budget proposal. Based on Trump's announcements, one might assume that U.S. climate finance has fallen to zero...Not true~~
Luckily, this is not the case. It is Congress that sets funding priorities in annual appropriations bills. Six months overdue, Congress has finally agreed an omnibus spending package to fund the entire government for FY18 (covering October 2017-September 2018).
For climate finance the budget is a mixed bag: some international climate funding has been preserved, some cut, and much left to the discretion of government agencies.
Good News: Congress Continues Some Climate Funding even with Trumps cut funding policies...
Congress has rejected some of the most damaging spending cuts proposed by the Trump administration, and some key funding items are largely in line with previous years:
Global Environment Facility (GEF): $139.5 million. Provides support not just for climate, but a host of environmental challenges, such as protecting biodiversity and tackling desertification. The US is the second-largest contributor in the GEF's current 4-year funding cycle, after Japan. Funding has been largely preserved, and stands at $7 million less than FY16 and 17 levels.
Montreal Protocol Multilateral Fund: $31 million. Supports developing countries to phase out ozone depleting substances, some of which are powerful greenhouse gases many times more potent than carbon dioxide. Funding is $1 million below FY17 levels, but the money that has been approved will have a big impact, increasing the fund's available resources by 38 percent.
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC): No allocation. These bodies are responsible for synthesizing the state of the art of climate science and providing a space for climate diplomacy. Funding was cut completely in the FY17 budget. This led a number of European countries to increase their funding, and Bloomberg Philanthropies to pledge $15 million to make up for the U.S. shortfall. In a positive move, the Trump administration has said it now wants to fund these bodies. The House of Representatives didn't seem to get this memo, rejecting the Senate's bipartisan recommendation to restore FY16 funding levels of $10 million. The administration could, however, still fund the UNFCCC and IPCC from discretionary funds.
<snip> much more to read should you wish..
https://www.wri.org/blog/2018/03/us-2018-budget-and-climate-finance-its-bad-not-bad-you-might-thinkAnd yet another worth the read~~still trying to fi... (