Ghana is a party to the Paris Agreement on climate change, which is seeking to reduce the rising atmospheric temperature to well below 2oC, preferably to 1.5 degrees Celsius, compared to pre-industrial levels. In line with the requirements of the Paris Agreement, the country has prepared its climate action plan, known as the Ghana Nationally Determined Contributions (GH-NDCs) to reduce emissions and adapt to the impacts of climate change.
To implement the country’s climate action plan, there is the need to mobilize about 22.6 billion US dollars from 2020-2030. It is estimated that, the country requires 16.3 billion US dollars (71.7% of the total investment) from external sources such as international private capital investments, bilateral funds, multilateral funds including the Green Climate Fund (GCF) to implement its climate mitigation and adaptation actions. Ghana is expected to mobilize 5% of the total required external resources from the GCF, whose mandate is to support developing countries with resources to address climate change.
It is therefore important for key stakeholders to understand the GCF funding processes to improve the quality of proposals to access funding. In Ghana, access to the GCF Fund must be done through a National Designated Authority (NDA), which is the Economic Strategy and Research Division (ESRD) of the Ministry of Finance.
At a sensitization session with key stakeholders in the Northern Region of Ghana on how to access GCF funding, Dr. Emmanuel Tachie-Obeng, a member of the Technical Advisory Committee to the NDA emphasized the need to ensure that all proposals for GCF fund fall within the country’s climate mitigation and adaptation focus areas. He outlined the economic priority areas for Ghana’s NDCs and encouraged applicants to relate their proposals to these areas. The areas are sustainable land use and food security; climate proof infrastructure; equitable social development; sustainable mass transport; sustainable energy security; sustainable forest management; and alternative urban waste management.
Mr. Foster Aboagye Gyamfi, Principal Economic Officer of the National Designated Authority (NDA) at the Ministry of Finance urged the district assemblies and other key stakeholders at the sensitization to collaborate and submit good proposals for review by the NDA Technical Advisory Committee for no-objection letter, before submitting to the GCF. He also encouraged the participants to explore other funding opportunities such as the Adaptation Fund (AF), Global Environment Facility (GEF), and Climate Investment Fund (CIF). He used the session to highlight the country’s processes for accessing the GCF funds. An applicant must:
- identify a climate mitigation or adaptation project;
- partner a GCF Accredited Entity (International/Regional/National Entity) like UNDP, World Bank, and Ecobank:
- develop concept note/funding proposal and submit to a sector ministry for a letter of support;
- submit the proposal to the Economic Strategy and Research Division (the NDA) of the Ministry of Finance, in line with GCF country programming requirements;
- obtain approval from the NDA Technical Advisory Committee and No-Objection Letter (NOL) from the NDA; and;
- finally submit the proposal to GCF for approval and funding.
“I didn’t know about the NDA at the Ministry of Finance and the GCF proposal submission processes till today. I work with women group and we will submit a proposal on biogas to seek funding to reduce the use of firewood as cooking fuel”, noted Yahtasu Alhasssan, Secretary, Women in Agriculture Platform, Savelugu.
The sensitization was carried out within Ghana’s NDA Readiness and Preparatory Support programme, which aims at strengthening capacities of national institutions to increase access to the GCF fund. The outreach is engaging and educating over 400 key stakeholders on climate change and the Green Climate Fund (GCF) processes in selected local languages (Dagbani, Ewe, Ga and Twi) in pilot districts in Ashanti, Volta, Northern and Greater Accra regions of Ghana. The participants include women and youth groups, district assembly staff, civil society organizations, community leaders, and representatives of the regional coordinating councils.
