With just $69 million in the bank account of the fledgling loss and damage fund so far, its new executive director was urged to keep running costs as low as possible at his first board meeting this month.<\/strong><\/p>\n Board members from 26 governments around the world questioned the fund\u2019s current and planned spending on consultants, business-class plane tickets and the need to have a deputy executive director, at the four-day meeting in the Philippines.<\/span><\/p>\n Harjeet Singh, a climate activist who was at the meeting, told Climate Home the fund\u2019s secretariat \u201cmust exercise the utmost caution and prudence in utilising resources intended for vulnerable communities recovering from climate impacts. It bears a profound responsibility to make decisions judiciously, particularly concerning its size and travel expenditures.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Governments agreed to <\/span>set up<\/span><\/a> the fund, <\/strong>which aims to help people whose lives have been shattered by extreme weather and rising seas fuelled by climate change, at the COP27 climate summit in Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt, after three decades of advocacy led by island nations.<\/span><\/p>\n Negotiators on the fund\u2019s board \u2013 12 from developed and 14 from developing nations \u2013 have spent the two years since then discussing the details of how the fund will work and, in September, they<\/span> chose<\/span><\/a> Senegalese-American banker Ibrahima Cheikh Diong to be its first executive director.<\/span><\/p>\n Senegalese banker Ibrahima Cheikh Diong picked to lead new loss and damage fund<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n At his first meeting with the board last week in Manila, Diong laid out his plan to get the organisation up and running so that it can start giving out money by the end of 2025.<\/span><\/p>\n The plan involves extensive use of external consultants \u2013 <\/strong>but some board members pushed back against the costs involved. Diong presented a budget that set aside nearly $0.7m to pay consultants in the first six months of 2025, out of a total budget of $4.3m.<\/span><\/p>\n Sudanese board member Sumaya Zakieldeen said the organisation \u2013 whose full name is the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage (FRLD) \u2013 should move towards getting in-house staff to do as much of the work as possible,<\/strong> as fast as possible next year.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n She said she found the prospect of waiting until 2026 to get most of the staff hired \u201ca little bit scary\u201d because it would mean using external advisers and consultants in the interim \u2013 \u201cand we know the cost implications of that\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n Fiji\u2019s Daniel Lund, however, said he supported the use of short-term consultants so that the fund can stay on track. \u201cWe don\u2019t see any other way to deliver that substance in the time-frames that we put in place,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n World Bank raises $100 billion for poor nations in boost for climate finance<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n A further $0.6m will be spent on staff travel in the first half of 2025. As the fund is hosted by the World Bank, it has taken on the bank\u2019s human resources policy, including its travel policy which allows staff to go business class if the flight is over five hours.<\/span><\/p>\n Denmark\u2019s Jens Fugl said the $0.6m was \u201csubstantial\u201d, adding that \u201ctravel should be on a need-to basis\u201d and \u201cnot everyone from the secretariat needs to be at all board meetings, because that would really be a significant cost that we should try to avoid\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n Diong replied that he wanted to develop a \u201cbottom-up approach\u201d by engaging with a range of groups around the world and \u201cyou can\u2019t do that from Washington DC\u201d, where the fund is based at the World Bank\u2019s headquarters.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n He added that travel was necessary to persuade governments to give more money to the fund. But, he promised, \u201cwe will be extremely sensitive in making sure that we don\u2019t over-travel\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n COP 29 Presidency signing ceremony, \u201cFrom Pledges to Action: Full Operationalization of the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage\u201d, in Baku, Azerbaijan, November 12, 2024. (Photo: IISD\/ENB | Mike Muzurakis)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The board members are not employed by the fund, which means they are not bound by the World Bank\u2019s rules and can set their own travel policy. The board decided that developed-country governments will pay for their own representatives to travel to meetings while the fund will pay for developing-country board members, their alternate member and one adviser each.<\/span><\/p>\n They decided to copy the policy of the United Nations and the Green Climate Fund, which is that flights should be economy class unless they are nine hours or longer, when personnel can chose business class but are \u201cencouraged to voluntarily downgrade\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n This policy was resisted by the US and Denmark, who wanted more economy travel to reduce spending and emissions. The US\u2019s Rebecca Lawlor said that flying business class produces three times as much greenhouse gas as economy class, while Denmark\u2019s Fugl said officials\u2019 mode of travel is \u201csomething there is a lot of scrutiny about\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\nClimate survivors\u2019 fund<\/h3>\n
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Business-class controversy<\/b><\/h3>\n
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