Albay Gov. Joey Salceda will shortly assume the Asian Group’s seat in the Green Climate Fund (GCF) board of directors to which he was recently elected by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
Salceda will attend the Green Climate Fund’s first board meeting on Aug. 23 to 25 at the Centre de Conference Verembe, Geneva, along with another Filipino, Agnes Mallorca Malfroy. The board will tackle organizational, administrative and operational concerns, including its work plan.
The Fund was created in the Copenhagen Conference of Parties. It has been allocated $20 billion per year in the first three years and $100 billion in the next five years, to carry out its mandate. At the behest of the Asian Group in the Fund, President Aquino nominated him to the international body.
Salceda has served as advisor to the GCF transitional committee. The UN earlier named him its global champion, and later spokesman, on Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) and Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) in recognition of innovative ideas implemented in his province and later adopted by other local governments and the national government.
The Asian Group at the UNFCCC has agreed to give its allocated seat in the GCF board to the Philippines for the first three years. The position needed a competent and knowledgeable finance expert with concrete experiences in climate-change financing.
Popularly known as a green economist, Salceda said the Philippines’ seat in the GCF board would help serve the needs of developing countries, enhance national and international action on climate change mitigation and realize the shared vision for long-term cooperative action, including a long-term global goal for gas emission reductions.
He said it was up to the GCF Board, given its very broad powers, to ensure the facility will be meaningfully effective in addressing climate-change concerns, particularly among developing countries that need the Fund to support their programs.
“Climate change financing will mainly go through the Green Climate Fund. A huge amount of financial resources will be involved, and it is essential that we get the initial operational principles and procedures right,” Salceda stressed.
The governor has been economic adviser to Philippine presidents and was a three-term congressman, before he became Albay governor where he implementedCCA and DRR programs, such as the National Conventions on Climate Change Adaptation.