Will There Be a Battle Over Climate Change Funds in Developing World?
We now know the price of climate adaptation in developing countries –- US$75-100 billion per year between 2010 and 2050. The recently published costs were explained by their World Bank estimators in a panel discussion at the Bank on Tuesday. But who, exactly, will do the adapting?
Most of the developing countries that will be hardest hit by climate change are poor (20) and some of them are classified as fragile (six). Poor –- and especially fragile – countries are already hard pressed to effectively implement current economic growth strategies because their governments don’t have adequate capacity in launching projects (e.g., local ownership, rigorous monitoring and evaluation, focus on results, feedback mechanism). Multilateral development banks, like the World Bank, are increasingly turning to non-governmental organizations to close the capacity gap.
Climate-adaptation spending – if it’s fully funded – would equal what’s now spent on “official development assistance” (ODA). Besides, climate adaptation, because it's unexplored terrain in many respects, will require a lot of learning, knowledge, and innovation. So how would the doubling of development funding be matched by capacity? The new cost-of-adaptation study says, very confidently: “For all sectors, adaptation costs include the costs of planned, public policy adaptation measures and exclude the costs of private adaptation.”
Does that mean that NGOs wouldn’t get a share of the billions of dollars in annual climate-adaptation funds that are expected to flow from developed to developing countries in coming years as part of the recent Copenhagen “accord”? Not necessarily. After Tuesday’s panel, I asked the chief author of the World Bank cost study, Sergio Margulis, if his numbers covered only climate adaptation carried out by national and regional governments, or might they be a “hybrid” that included NGOs. “A hybrid,” he said.
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Development Marketplace finalists especially will want to consider applying to GSBI. 
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Some other of the 72 non-winning DM finalists where the target beneficiaries cannot afford to be the direct economic buyer may have similar stories. .bmp)
nd the week of dialogues, panel discussions, and other activities unfolded in Washington, but people around the world were able to become virtual participants. From Russia, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Djibouti, Uganda, Belize, and scores of other countries, instant connections were made via YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, and the DM blog..png)
October, and the DM Twitter account enlisted more than 123 global followers who tweeted 600 times. New social media connections continue to be made weeks after the competition, and, as you can see, this blog continues to draw new posts and comments.
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tu spend half their day in darkness. For them, there is no electric grid. Instead they must rely on kerosene and other polluting and sometimes dangerous power sources. But safe, cost-effective, environmentally friendly, and accessible power sources are coming on the market in Vanuatu and other, mostly rural countries in the Pacific islands and elsewhere. 
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Q. Is your country in its adaptation program doing enough to develop capacity -- knowledge and learning -- among government and civil society organizations?