Definition: this indicator measures Belgium's public contribution to the green climate fund, as decided in the negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). This type of financing aims to support developing countries in their fight against climate change and its effects. This indicator only includes Belgium’s public contributions from the federal state’s and regional budgets. The data come from the National Climate Commission, that publishes the data on it's own website and on the EIONET website of the European Environment Agency (EIONET, Greenhouse gas Monitoring Mechanism Regulation, Art. 16 - Financial and technology support provided to developing countries).

Goal: the Belgian contribution to the green climate fund must increase year after year until 2020 and not decline thereafter.

The Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs adopted by the UN in 2015 include target 13.a: "Implement the commitment undertaken by developed country Parties to the UNFCCC to a goal of mobilizing jointly USD100 billion annually by 2020 from all sources to address the needs of developing countries in the context of meaningful mitigation actions and transparency on implementation and fully operationalize the Green Climate Fund through its capitalization as soon as possible".

At the 15^th Conference of the Parties in Copenhagen in 2009, industrialised countries pledged to jointly provide 100 billion US dollars per year as from 2020 to help developing countries fight climate change and its effects. The industrialised countries also made commitments to gradually increase their contribution between 2010 and 2020.

The target breakdown among countries was not negotiated. There is thus no recognised criterion for assigning a goal to Belgium. Nevertheless, in the Belgian political agreement on burden sharing of 4 December 2015, Belgium pledged itself to an annual financing of 50 million euros until 2020 (National Climate Commission, 2015). The financing is shared among the federal state (25 million) and the regions (14.5, 8.25 and 2.25 million euros respectively for the Flemish, Walloon and Brussels-Capital Regions).

The aim is to contribute equitably to the joint annual raising of 100 billion US dollars by 2020. To contribute to this commitment, developed countries must increase, year by year, their financing to reach 100 billion by 2020 since this annual flow has not yet been achieved (UNFCCC, 2013 and 2018). The aim is therefore to increase the Belgian contribution year by year until 2020 to provide a fair Belgian contribution to the common objective of 100 billion US dollars.

International comparison: this indicator is not relevant for international comparison because country contributions are recorded very differently. The contribution of Belgium is mainly composed of donations, while, for many others, it mainly consists of loans.

UN Indicator: the selected indicator corresponds to indicator 13.a.1 - Mobilised amount of US dollars per year starting in 2020 accountable towards the $100 billion commitment.

Sources

• General

  • SDGs, Sustainable Development Goals: United Nations (2015), Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Resolution adopted by the General Assembly on 25 September 2015, document A/RES/70/1.

  • Indicators: United Nations (2017), Work of the Statistical Commission pertaining to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Resolution adopted by the General Assembly on 6 July 2017, document A/RES/71/313.

  • UN Sustainable Development: https://sdgs.un.org/ (consulted on 18/01/2023).

  • UN Sustainable Development Goal indicators website: https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/ (consulted on 18/01/2023).

• Specific

  • National Climate Commission (2015), Accord politique sur le Burden-Sharing intra-belge, https://www.cnc-nkc.be/fr/cadre-legal/accords-de-cooperation-protocole-etc (consulted on26/04/2019)

  • UNFCCC (2013), Long term climate finance, Decision 3/CP.19, www.unfccc.int

  • UNFCCC (2018), Report of the Conference of the Parties on its twenty-fourth session, held in Katowice from 2 to 15December (Document FCCC/CP/2018/10/Add.1, decision 3/CP.24), www.unfccc.int.

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