Raising the Bar: India’s Push to Increase Ambition on Climate Finance

For India, availability and access to affordable finance remains a continuing challenge in its progress towards its climate commitments. The latest Economic Survey of India estimates that financing to the tune of USD 2.5 trillion is necessary to meet India’s Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) targets till 2030. In addition, India’s first Adaptation Communication submitted to United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) outlines the cumulative need for adaptation financing of approximately USD 673 billion by 2030. India argues that progress on its climate outcomes has been achieved primarily through domestic resources until now, thus making a strong case for developed countries to provide finance and technology to developing countries at reasonable cost.

UNFCCC’s 29^th Conference of Parties (COP29) to be held from 11-22 November 2024 in Baku, Azerbaijan is likely to pave the way for the most significant outcome on climate finance in recent years. Over the course of the two weeks, countries will deliver the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) on climate finance. In 2009, at the 15th Conference of Parties (COP15) in Copenhagen, developed countries agreed that they would mobilize USD 100 billion per year by 2020 to support developing countries’ climate action. In 2015, NCQG emerged as one of the key elements of the Paris Agreement and parties agreed to set, prior to 2025, a new collective quantified goal from a floor of USD 100 billion per year, taking into account the needs and priorities of developing countries. This November, parties to the UNFCCC will gather in Baku to set a new global climate finance goal, and India will be a central player, along with other developing countries, in demanding greater ambition and more transparency in the new targets.