Finance ministers alliance for climate action urges collaboration for COP29

Members of the Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action have been called for collaboration in holding the 29th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP29) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change successfully, which delivers an ambitious and equitable climate finance goal, the Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources of Azerbaijan, President of COP29, Mukhtar Babayev, said, Azernews reports, citing the Ministry of Finance.

He made the remark at the 11th meeting of the Coalition of Finance Ministers on Climate Action within the spring meeting of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank Group in Washington.

Azerbaijan, which joined the Coalition as an observer in April of this year, was represented at the meeting by the Minister of Finance, Samir Sharifov, and President-Designate of COP29, Mukhtar Babayev.

Speaking at the meeting, Babayev thanked the Coalition for its active participation in the implementation of climate goals.

The meeting focused on the effective organization of financing needs for the implementation of the Nationally Determined Contributions (commitments taken by the countries of the world to reduce greenhouse gases). In addition to the finance ministers of the coalition member countries, Kristalina Georgieva, the managing director of the IMF, and Ajay Banga, the president of the World Bank, also participated at the meeting.

The Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action, which currently has 92 countries as members, was established during the 2018 Annual Meeting of the IMF and World Bank held in Indonesia in order to mobilise financial resources to accelerate actions related to climate change. The Secretariat of the Coalition is located at the World Bank's headquarters in Washington, DC, and is jointly managed by the World Bank and the IMF. The coalition's activities are supported by 26 institutional partners, including the IMF, the World Bank Group, the Asian Development Bank, the European Investment Bank, the African Development Bank Group, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and the United Nations Development Program.

The finance ministries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and Indonesia, which are the co-chairs of the coalition, sent an invitation letter regarding Azerbaijan's joining the coalition. As the host of COP29, Azerbaijan intends to actively cooperate with the Coalition.