(BSS) - Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) have announced that their global climate finance reached a record high of US$125

billion in 2023.

Last year, the combined total from the institutions including the Asian Development Bank (ADB) is more than double the amount provided in 2019, when MDBs announced their ambition to increase climate finance levels over time at the United Nations Secretary General`s Climate Action Summit, said an ADB press release here today.

"We welcome the fact that MDBs provided record climate finance last year-
every dollar of which makes a difference in helping to cut carbon emissions
or preparing people and infrastructure for the worst impacts of climate
change, much of which we must recognize is already baked in," said Bruno
Carrasco, director general (DG) for Sustainable Development and Climate
Change of ADB.

"There remains a large financing gap and the ADB will continue to work
closely with other MDBs- and in its own right- to get as much financing as
possible to our developing member countries," he added.

Last year, around $74.7 billion of MDB climate finance was directed towards
low and middle-income economies. Of this sum, 67 percent or $50 billion went
to climate change mitigation and $24.7 billion or 33 percent for climate
change adaptation.

The amount of mobilized private finance for this group of countries stood at
$28.5 billion.

In 2023, $50.3 billion was allocated for high-income economies. Of this
amount, $47.3 billion or 94 percent was for climate change mitigation and the
remaining $3 billion or six percent went to climate change adaptation. The
amount of mobilized private finance for high-income countries stood at $72.7
billion.

The fresh announcement comes in the run-up to COP29 to be held in Baku,
Azerbaijan in November 2024. One of the key deliverables of COP29 is to
increase global climate finance and to reach agreement on the new collective
quantified goal on climate finance.

The Joint Report on Multilateral Development Banks` Climate Finance is an
annual collaboration to publish MDBs` climate finance figures, together with
a clear explanation of the methodologies for tracking this finance.

The joint report, along with the banks` independent publication of their own
individual climate finance statistics, is intended to track progress in
relation to their joint climate finance commitments-such as those announced
at COP21 and the greater ambition pledged for the post-2020 period.

The 2023 multilateral development bank report, coordinated by the European
Investment Bank (EIB), combines data from the African Development Bank
(AfDB), the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the Asian Infrastructure Investment
Bank (AIIB), the Council of Europe Development Bank (CEB), the European Bank
for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the EIB, the Inter-American
Development Bank (IDB), the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), the New
Development Bank (NDB) and the World Bank Group (WBG).

ADB is committed to achieving a prosperous, inclusive, resilient and
sustainable Asia and the Pacific while sustaining its efforts to eradicate
extreme poverty. Established in 1966, it is owned by 68 members- 49 from the
region.