— Norway to contribute US$30M this year
PRESIDENT Bharrat Jagdeo and Norway’s Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg yesterday announced the establishment of the Guyana REDD+ Investment Fund (GRIF) and stated that they have invited the World Bank to act as the fund manager.
Norway will be the first contributor to the GRIF and will pay US$30M into the fund when it is established, planned at the end of this month. The payment is in recognition of Guyana’s efforts to protect its 16 million hectare rainforest and follows the memorandum of understanding signed by the two countries in November last year.
Norway intends to pay up to US$250M into the GRIF between 2010 and 2015, based on Guyana’s performance in avoiding greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, as well as Guyana’s ongoing and planned strengthening of inclusive and transparent forest management.
Guyana will invest GRIF revenues to implement the country’s Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS).
This will enable Guyana to place its forest under long-term protection, catalyse public and private investment for clean energy (to move virtually the entire economy away from fossil fuel energy dependence), and create new low carbon economic and employment opportunities for forest dependent communities and other Guyanese citizens.
The process will be evolving with the full and effective participation of involved stakeholders, including indigenous peoples groups.
President Jagdeo said Prime Minister Stoltenberg has long demonstrated global leadership in the fight against climate change.
He noted that after the United Nations climate change summit in Copenhagen, Denmark last December, “this leadership was particularly vital, and thanks to the Prime Minister’s efforts, the Interim REDD+ partnership, recently established by close to 60 countries at the Oslo Climate and Forest Conference, presents the world with a real chance to make progress on reducing deforestation and forest degradation.”
“To support this, the work our two countries are doing together will provide the world with a model of how national scale action to protect forests can help to create a path to a prosperous, low carbon future. We can deliver long-term economic growth alongside a commitment to globally accepted social and environmental safeguards”, the President said.
He added: “Too many people say this is not possible; we hope to prove them wrong.”
Prime Minister Stoltenberg called Guyana’s model “truly visionary” and said that not only is the country making tough decisions to protect its forest, “but it is also planning to invest heavily to move its economy on to a long-term low carbon trajectory.”
“Paying to reduce and avoid emissions from deforestation is one of the most cost effective ways to combat climate change, and also has significant additional benefits regarding biodiversity, climate change adaptation and rights, and livelihoods for forest dependent communities. This is good for Guyana and good for the world”, he said.
President Jagdeo and Prime Minister Stoltenberg repeated their desire to continue a close political dialogue on the global response to climate change.
They are in New York to attend the second meeting of the UN Secretary General’s Advisory Group on Finance, set up to identify ways to raise US$100 billion in annual climate finance for developing countries by 2020.
Finance Minister Dr. Ashni Singh will set out further details regarding the GRIF in a statement to Guyana’s National Assembly tomorrow.
Further details about the LCDS are available at www.lcds.gov.gy (GINA)