The looming climate ‘fiscal cliff’: an evaluation of fast start finance and its lessons for the future
This report is the summary of Oxfam's research on developed nations' Fast Start Finance pledges. It (i) asserts that developing countries face a climate ‘fiscal cliff’ at the end of 2012, as Fast Start Finance expires and the Green Climate Fund remains empty after a year of extreme weather; (ii) reveals that governments have not delivered on commitments made in Copenhagen to ensure the funding was new, additional and balanced across adaptation and mitigation projects; and (iii) calls for developed nations to scale up climate finance from 2013, consider innovative proposals to raise public climate finance, and make pledges to the Green Climate Fund that otherwise will remain an empty shell for the third year in a row.