World Bank Group Launches Ksh.50 Trillion for Climate Adaptation and Resilience

A 50 trillion-shilling action plan on climate change adaptation and resilience has been launched by the World Bank Group.

Climate change poses an acute and increasing threat to global development. Under the plan, the World Bank will ramp up direct adaptation climate finance to reach the target over FY21–25.

This financing level, an average of 10 trillion shillings a year, is more than double what was achieved during FY15-18.

The World Bank is also set to pilot new approaches to increase private finance for adaptation and resilience.

According to World Bank Chief Executive Kristalina Georgieva, the new plan will put climate resilience on an equal footing with the bank’s investment in a low carbon future for the first time.

“We do this because simply put, the climate is changing so we must mitigate and adopt at the same time and ramp up our funding to help people build a more resilient future, especially the poorest and most vulnerable who are most affected,” added Kristalina Georgieva.

The Action Plan builds on the link between adaptation and development by promoting effective and early actions that also provide positive development outcomes. For example, investing in mangrove replanting may protect a local community against sea level rise and storm surges, while also creating new opportunities for eco-tourism and fisheries.

Early and proactive adaptation and resilience-building actions are more cost-effective than addressing impacts after they occur.

The Action Plan also includes the development of a new rating system to create incentives for, and improve the tracking of, global progress on adaptation and resilience.

The new system will be piloted by the World Bank in FY19-20 and rolled out to projects in relevant sectors by FY21.