Civil society organizations (CSOs) in the climate change and environment sectors have expressed worry over the cumbersome Green Climate Fund (GCF) accreditation process.
They said the process is frustratingly rigorous, expensive and unnecessarily prohibitive for most local SCOs. Leaders of various CSOs expressed the sentiments on Friday on Mponera, Dowa during a national stakeholder meeting on GCF processes in Malawi organized by Civil Society Organization on Climate Change (Cisonecc) with support from Care Malawi.
According to Leadership for Environment and Development Southern and Eastern Africa (Lead-SEA) regional director professor Sosten Chiotha, there is need for government to support the CSOs through the accreditation process so that they are able to develop and submit project proposals to the GCF.
He said: ‘The GCF presents a great opportunity for Malawi to mobilize resources for climate adaptation and mitigation. However , access to the fund by local CSOs is almost impossible due to the fund’s prohibitive processes and requirements.
“Government should deliberately support local CSOs in getting GCF accreditation to enable them access funding.”
On his part, Cisonecc national coordinator Julius Ng’oma said GCF is an important climate financing mechanism that Malawi should benefit from in the face of limited domestic financing for climate change management.
He said; Having a GCF locally accredited entity will enhance local CSOs’ access to the fund thereby benefiting the country.”
The GCF, is a $8.8 billion climate financing mechanism under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change which was introduced in 2010 to support climate change adaptation and mitigation efforts in developing countries.
Source: Nation_Sosten Mpinganjira_Contributor_13/9/2021