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Integrating gender considerations into climate change policies and programs

N o r d i c D e v e l o p m e n t F u n d

Climate change initiativesare today often treated as“gender neutral.” The dif-ferent rights, roles and re-sponsibilities of men andwomen are not taken intoconsideration even thoughthe impact of climate changevaries between men andwomen. Tasks traditionallycarried out by women, suchas securing food, waterand fuel for cooking andheating, will, due to cli-mate change effects, be-come increasingly difficult.At the same time, women,as primary caretakers ofchildren and household,are less mobile than men.These aspects, combinedwith the disproportionateaccess to education and thedecision-making process,make women - constitutingthe majority of the world’s

poor - in many contextsmore vulnerable to climatechange than men.

There is a general con-cern that gender consider-ations are missing fromnational policy dialogueand the operation of manyongoing and planned cli-mate projects. To ensurethat women benefit equallywith men from climatechange investments, a newapproach is needed wheregender concerns are incor-porated in national policiesand project guidelines.

In an effort to main-stream gender into climate-related activities, NDF isco-financing a project withthe Asian DevelopmentBank (ADB) that aims to influence and improve theinstitutional settings forgender and climate change

considerations in Laos, Cam-bodia and Vietnam. The proj-ect will focus on capacity- building and policymaking on national and sub-nationallevels in the targeted coun-tries and will involve gov-ernment agencies, women’sgroups and NGOs. In addi-tion, three pilot projects willbe carried out to function asa link between hands-on climate change mitigationwork and the development of carbon finance-relatedpolicies. Within the pilots,methods for increasingwomen’s participation in thedissemination of low carbontechnologies will be devel-oped as well as tools andmechanisms to access cli-mate financing. Further-more, a regional knowledgehub will be established todisseminate information

throughout the region.According to Linda Lundqvist,Country Program Managerat NDF, “NDF will follow theproject closely as the out-comes and lessons learnt willbe useful for future NDFprojects.” The NDF grant isEUR 2 million.

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Policy on Access to Information

In its 31 May 2011 meeting,NDF’s Board of Directorsadopted the Fund’s first Policy on Access to Infor-mation. In line with thepolicies of other multilateralfinanciers, NDF strives foropenness. The policy can be found at NDF websiteunder PUBLICATIONS.

Identifyingclimate-friendly investmentopportunitiesDuring recent years, sev-eral investment projectshave been implemented inthe public and private sec-tors in Central America.Within the Inter-AmericanDevelopment Bank, theStructured and CorporateFinance Department (SCF)is responsible for the non-sovereign guarantee invest-ments in Latin America andthe Caribbean. NDF will fi-nance a project that will re-view SCF’s clients’ facilitiesto identify concrete invest-ment opportunities for cli-mate-friendly improvements.

Central America reliesheavily on fossil fuels.

Meanwhile the region’s energy efficiency could besubstantially improved andrenewable energy sourcescould be substituted forfossil fuels, especially inpublic and private facilitiesand production plants. “Although the benefitsfrom increased use of re-newable energy and im-proved energy efficiencyare easily demonstrated,several barriers continue to impede more efficientenergy use in the region,”says Country ProgramManager Hannu Eerola.These barriers include lackof incentives and aware-ness of the economic andenvironmental benefits,and lack of adequate finan-cial instruments to supportenergy efficiency and re-newable energy technologies.

The project aims to carryout prefeasibility studies inSCF’s clients’ facilities toreview the energy use and

propose actions for climate-friendly improvements thatwill bring the facilities upto date in terms of technol-ogy and operational prac-tices. The studies are expect-ted to result in the imple-mentation of renewable energy and energy efficiency projects. Based on the out-come, SCF will look tocatalyse funds to financethe resulting projects.“Smaller implementation measures not requiringmajor investments can besupported directly fromproject funds, for examplesimple facility upgrades,capacity development orsimilar that could be car-ried out with minimal invest-ment,” says Eerola.

The total cost of the pro-ject is EUR 2 million, of whichNDF will finance EUR 1.5million. The focus areas forthe studies are: Nicaragua,Honduras, Guatemala, ElSalvador and Costa Rica.

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Increasing the water sectors’ resilience to climate change

Water has been recognisedas one of the main meansthrough which climatechange will negatively affect the population and

the environment in LatinAmerica. In order to developrealistic adaptation strate-gies that will help the re-gion achieve sustainable

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development, one needs tounderstand the potential impacts and costs climatechange has on the watersector. NDF is together withthe Inter-American Develop-ment Bank (IDB) co-finan-cing a project that aims tolay out the foundation forfuture adaptation invest-ments within the water re-source sector. Through casestudies on sea level rise impacts in Honduras andincreased hydrologic ex-tremes in Nicaragua, theproject intends to deter-mine the additional costs ofadaptation actions in the re-gion. The main objectiveof the project is to provideinput to policy develop-ment and identify feasible

climate change adaptationinvestment projects in thewater sector.

The study will comple-ment and benefit from therecently NDF approved Eco-nomics of Climate ChangeStudy. “There are synergiesbetween the two projectsand relevant findings will be exchanged through jointparticipation in workshopsand other outreach activi-ties,” says Aage Jørgensen,Country Program Managerat NDF.

NDF has granted EUR800,000 to help finance twomajor case studies, capacity-building activities, and thepreliminary design of twospecific investment projects.

NDF supports two preparatory climate change projects

in Central America

Reducing infrastructureassets’ vulnerabilityto climatechange in AfricaSub-Saharan Africa suffersfrom a very weak infra-structural base, which isconsidered to be a key fac-tor to why the region failsto realise its full potentialfor economic growth. Cli-mate change is further de-teriorating the existinginfrastructure and thusjeopardising the technical,financial and economic via-bility of future infrastruc-ture investments.

A few years ago, theWorld Bank conducted astudy in Africa to find outthe magnitude of the conti-nent’s infrastructure chal-lenges. The study resultedin the Africa Infrastruc-ture Country Diagnostics(AICD), which is a state-of-the-art data and analyticalplatform documenting thestatus of main infrastruc-ture sectors in 24 countriesin Sub-Saharan Africa.NDF is now, together withother financiers, providingthe necessary funds to theWorld Bank to conduct anadditional study, whichwill add a climate changedimension to the AICD.

“Adding the climate changedimension to the previousstudy is a cost-efficientway to address the vulner-ability of African infra-structure and estimate theadditional costs attributableto climate change,” saysCountry Program ManagerHannu Eerola.

The AICD has alreadyassembled a considerableamount of spatial data oninfrastructure and finan-cial needs of infrastructurerequirements that couldprovide a basis for a morethorough continentalanalysis of the vulnerabil-ity of infrastructure assetsto climate change. By lay-ering a climate dimensionon the AICD analysis, itwill be possible to build amore comprehensive pic-ture of where investmentsshould be prioritised, andwhat the adaptation costsmight be.

The objective of thisstudy is to assist Africancountries in reducing thevulnerability of regionalinfrastructure assets to cli-mate change and catalysethe policy dialogue on thedevelopment and deploy-ment of climate finance instruments.

The new study willcover four areas of infra-structure: irrigation,power, roads and waterstorage. The total cost ofthe study is estimated atEUR 800,000, of whichNDF will finance up toEUR 600,000.

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Climate-proofingroads in

the northern mountainous areas

of Vietnam

NDF supports transport project in Senegal

Vietnam’s mountain ecosys-tems are recognised asbeing extremely vulnerableto climate change. Despitethis fact, much of the atten-tion with respect to climatechange impacts and adapta-tion has been concentratedon its long coastline. To fillthis gap, NDF is togetherwith the Asian DevelopmentBank (ADB) co-financing aninfrastructure project inthe northern mountainousareas of Vietnam. With agrant of EUR 2 million,NDF is adding a climatechange adaptation aspectinto Transport Connectionsin Northern MountainousProvinces, an ADB-fundedproject.

The NDF-financed activi-ties will address potentialdamage caused to roadtransport infrastructure bychanges in climate, such asincreased temperatures,changes in rainfall patterns

and extreme weather events.The outcome will be betterand more reliable road con-nectivity with increased re-silience to climate change.The NDF component willfocus primarily on techni-cal assistance and capacity-building of relevant stake-holders to consider climatechange adaptation strate-gies in the design, planningand maintenance of road infrastructure.

Within NDF’s climatechange mandate, infra-structure is one of NDF’sfocal areas. To date, twoNDF projects within roadinfrastructure are being im-plemented; one in Cambodia(Adaptation Approaches forthe Transport Sector) andone in Senegal (Transportand Urban Mobility Proj-ect). The roads project inVietnam will build on expe-rience gained from the twoongoing projects.

Abdoulaye DIOP, Ministerof Economy and Finance in Senegal, and Martina Jägerhorn, Country Program Manager at NDF, signed anagreement on 21 March 2011regarding NDF’s grant con-tribution to the Integrating

Climate Change Adaptationto Transport project underthe World Bank’s projectSenegal Transport and UrbanMobility. The signing of thisagreement makes Senegalthe largest recipient of NDFgrants.

GRANT FINANCING FOR CLIMATE CHANGEPROJECTS IN LOW-INCOME COUNTRIES

The Nordic Development Fund (NDF) provides grant financing for climatechange interventions in low-income developing countries. NDF is the joint development finance institution of the Nordic countries—Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden—and finances projects in cooperation with otherdevelopment institutions.

NORDIC DEVELOPMENT FUND, P.O. Box 185, FIN-00171 Helsinki, Finland (Visiting address: Fabianinkatu 34), Tel: +358 10 618 002, Fax: +358 9 622 1491, E-mail: info.ndf@ndf.fi,

www.ndf.fi

Nordic Development Fund

NDF Newsletter presents NDF's operations. The newsletter is published as needed. Layout Kubik, print Libris Oy.

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Improved sanitationand sewage

management will helpreduce emissions

The sanitation situation inthe Greater Accra Metropoli-tan area in Ghana is highlyunsatisfactory and unsus-tainable. Over the past twodecades, the area’s popula-tion has increased rapidly,putting great stress on thearea’s urban infrastructure.The sewerage system hasvery limited coverage and a majority of new houses depend on septic tanks, pitor bucket latrines and un-sewered public toilets. Largevolumes of collected septageand nightsoil are dumpedinto the sea or temporarydumps and pits, causing serious environmental prob-lems, including methaneemissions.

To strengthen the finan-cial and operational perfor-mance of the Greater Accraseptage management opera-tions, NDF will co-financethe Greater Accra SeptageDigesters project togetherwith the World Bank. TheNDF grant of EUR 2.5 mil-lion will be used for the design of two identicalanaerobic septage/nightsoildigester plants and for co-financing the works and

equipment. Each of the plantswill have the capacity to re-ceive 500m3 of septage andfaecal sludge per day.

The project is primarilyan environmental sanitationproject but has climate changemitigation benefits. Thegreenhouse gas (GHG)emissions resulting frompoor management of sep-tage will be reduced. In ad-dition, renewable energy inthe form of biogas from theanaerobic digesters willsubstitute the use of fossilfuels. The annual emissionsreduction potential from thetwo plants together is esti-mated at 7,800 tCO2e. Overthe range of 20-25 years ofexpected lifetime of theplants, the total amount ofemission reductions couldrange from 160,000 to200,000 tCO2e.

Septage and sludge tipping fees, revenues fromsales of certified emission reductions and revenuesfrom sales of biogas-basedelectricity will enhance the sustainability of the area’s septage management opera-tions.

Reducing coastal areas’ vulnerability to climate change

The coast of Tanzania is con-sidered to be highly vulnera-ble to the impacts of climatechange.Impacts such as sealevel rise, coastal erosion, saltwater intrusion, and in-crease in sea temperaturenegatively affect the coastalpopulations’ livelihoods.

NDF has granted EUR800,000 for a preparationstudy on coastal adaptationto climate change in Tanza-nia. The study is co-financedwith the World Bank and aimsto examine the impacts cli-mate change has on coastalareas and identify specificadaptation investments to enhance resilience.

The study will add a cli-mate change dimension

into ongoing and planneddonor- and government-funded activities. The objec-tive is to promote sustainablecoastal development andsupport Tanzania in the development and imple-mentation of a long-term vision to decrease coastalvulnerability to climatechange. “By incorporatingan analysis of climatechange considerations intoexisting programs, it willbe possible to build a morecomprehensive picture ofwhere investments shouldbe prioritised and what theadaptation costs might be,”says Aage Jørgensen,Country Program Managerat NDF.

NDF and ADB signed in the context of the ADB Annual Meeting in Hanoi a grant agreement for the project Capacity Buildingfor Efficient Utilization of Biomass for Bioenergy and Food Security in the Greater Mekong Subregion. The project received a grant contribution of EUR 3.1 million from NDF.

NDF and the Government of Cambodia signed a grant agreementfor the project Adaptation Approaches for the Transport Sector. The grant contribution of EUR 4.2 million will be used for climatechange adaptation measures and capacity building within the ADB co-financed Rural Roads Improvement Project.

The agreement for the Adaptation Approaches for the Transport Sector Project was signed by, from the left: Mr. Helge Semb, Managing Director of NDF, Ms. Satu Santala, Chair of the Board of Directors of NDF and Mr. H.E. Vongsey Vissoth, Secretary General, Ministry of Economy and Finance.

In May, NDF signed two agreements in Hanoi